


Rockstars with Poodles

by ElDiablito_SF, Zoi no miko (zoi_no_miko)



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Explicit Sexual Content, Honestly we're embarrassed for both of them, Like you had any doubt, M/M, Poodles, Rock Ballads, grossness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-07
Updated: 2017-01-07
Packaged: 2018-09-07 03:55:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 30,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8781973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElDiablito_SF/pseuds/ElDiablito_SF, https://archiveofourown.org/users/zoi_no_miko/pseuds/Zoi%20no%20miko
Summary: Flint’s the rockstar. When the coolest rockstar wants to be your friend, no matter what you said about it before, he kind of goes like “Yeah, I’m gonna be buddies with him. The coolest rockstar in pirate town." - Luke ArnoldHE SAID IT.  WE WROTE IT.





	1. Ambien Walrus

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ellel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellel/gifts).



> First and foremost, we'd like to thank [Elle](ellelan.tumblr.com) for being a consummate enabler and a true friend and wish her a very happy birthday! Darling, you deserve all the poodles!
> 
> Second, we'd like to acknowledge that the original idea of turning Luke's quote into a Rockstar AU came from hotface [Sus](silversflint.tumblr.com) and therefore she's at the very least a godmother to this oeuvre. Thanks, Sus! Happy (almost) birthday to you too!

“Fuck England!” came the traditional, closing, guttural cry from James Flint as he set another Union Jack on fire right in the middle of the stage, and the crowd went wild.

John Silver still couldn’t believe he was there, in the thick of it, pressed up against the railing so hard he was about to mate with it. It wasn’t his first time at an Ambien Walrus concert, not even the tenth time, yet somehow this one felt different. Perhaps because Flint bent over the edge of the stage in the middle of the chorus of “The Queen Can Suck It”, his leather pants stretched so tightly over his shapely thighs that Silver could swear he saw the outline of his gigantic cock, and made eye contact with him. It did not last longer than a second, but that second was enough to give Silver the biggest boner of his life.

“Jesus Christ, he looked at me. He looked right at me. Oh sweet Jesus, help me!” Silver’s mind threatened to go into chaotic tailspin as he turned to his roommate, Muldoon, who had agreed to accompany him on this road trip. “Do you think he likes me? What if he likes me?”

“You’re insane!” Muldoon yelled back over the din of the crowd, seemingly unimpressed.

As the Union Jack burned and the band exited the stage, Silver’s mind was resolved. Tonight was the night. He was going to get backstage and he was going to… What? Well, at the very least trip and drool all over James Flint. Carpe noctum!

~~~

They had originally come to some prominence as The Rangers, back in the days when Charles Vane was the lead singer. More growl than man, Charles Vane and his propensity to take off random articles of clothing on stage had drawn crowds. Rumor had it, it was all Eleanor Guthrie’s fault that he had left the band and gone solo, performing under the eponymous if slightly megalomaniacal name VANE.

As far as Jack Rackham was concerned, rumor it could stay. He wasn't about to comment on the numerous mornings he'd found Eleanor and Vane bunked down naked in the tour bus, nor the more numerous mornings he'd found Vane with a hotel room full of fangirls - and fanboys. He'd had words with Vane about it exactly one time - that you could fuck your bandmates OR the groupies, but certainly not both - and been told to fuck right off. 

And it wasn't like he didn't know how hard it was to make that choice, not with hundreds of adoring young boys and girls reaching for you night after night, getting your name jailhouse tattooed on their body. But Anne was worth it, and Max was worth it, and that was all there was to it.

And Eleanor was more than their bandmate; she was the damn band’s manager. That’s like sticking your cock into the food grinder. Serves him right if Eleanor had kicked him out.

He hadn't quite made up his mind about Vane's replacement, though. James "Flint" McGraw. "Flint", in the public eye. _Or_ for that matter, the band’s new name. What even _was_ an Ambien Walrus? But Flint had suggested it, and Eleanor and the rest had gobbled it up whole, muttering utter nonsense about how “punk” it was and how it added “much needed mystique.”

“I don’t understand why I couldn’t have simply taken Charles’ position as the frontman,” Jack had grumbled.

“Nothing about you, darling,” Max had tried to be conciliatory. “But you know, a frontman should have that _je ne sais quoi_ that you simply do not have.”

“What _tu ne sais quoi_?” Jack had prodded, foolishly.

“Raw animal magnetism,” Anne had replied with a sneer.

Jack had resolved then to quietly resent the man, at least until his quiet resentment boiled over into simmering hatred. But he had to admit, Flint did look awfully good in his ridiculous leather pants and army coats with bloody epaulets on them. The wanker.

And of course the fucker had to be a dog owner. Dogs. On tour. Not even a respectable dog like a Great Dane or a German Shepard or a Rottie. No, their fearless new leader owned _poodles_. Small, yappy, in the plural.

"They're hypoallergenic," Flint had sneered at him the first time Jack had seen them, at the start of the tour. As if that explained bloody everything.

"Because the last thing we'd want, as a respectable punk rock band, would be for our fans to break out in hives?"

But Flint was already down the road with three fluffy bundles of yip bounding after him, ready to pee on anything he commanded them to.

As Flint took them back into the bus, one of them neatly lifted its leg and let out a stream onto Rackham's suede shoe.

"Fucking hell, Flint!"

"Porthos! In the bus!" Flint ruffled the dog's brown curls. "Good girl."

"Good? It pissed on my fucking shoe! They’re suede, Flint! Do you know how hard it is to clean these things?"

“That’s what you get for wearing suede in the first place,” Flint squinted and bared his teeth as if he was part dog himself.

“You should talk!” Jack couldn’t control himself. “I’ve seen that black velvet suit you’re bringing on tour! And what kind of name is ‘Porthos’ for a poodle?”

“It is an excellent name,” Flint sneered. “Porthos is a true and loyal companion. She never tries to hump anyone and she doesn’t shit on the furniture, like the other two.”

“Christ!” Jack exclaimed. “The other two hump and shit on furniture?”

“Athos and Aramis have had a very difficult childhood,” Flint shrugged, and that had, apparently, been the end of that discussion.

Jack had turned to Anne for support, feeling caught somewhere in the middle of exploding in frustration and shooting himself in the fucking head. She shoved a bottle of whiskey into his hand. "Let's just get on the road. Maybe we can leave 'em behind in Boston while he's not looking."

But, overall, Jack realized he’d been lucky to even still have a job. Leading frontmen, especially for a band like Ambien Walrus - a bloody gypsy punk rock band - weren’t exactly lining the streets. And this one too was rumored to have classical violin training (what the actual fuck?)! And with Anne playing lead guitar, while Max played the accordion, Jack suspected that his own position - that of the bass guitarist - was a lot easier to replace. Rounding out the lineup was their drummer, Billy “Arms” Bones, whom at least Jack always found to lend a reliable extra dosage of testosterone if only by straightening out to his full height.

He only hoped Billy wouldn’t suddenly turn out to be a dog person.

~~~

He was not ashamed to admit, John Silver had lined up three hours in advance to get that spot at the railing, in the hope that Flint might accidentally sweat on him. He wasn’t always like this, he recalled, he _used_ to have a modicum of pride and decorum. He was, after all, an educated man, an aspiring writer, the soul of a poet, etc. etc., whatever title would get him faster into the pants of his next chosen conquest. He used to think, in fact, that he was a _very_ charming guy. A difficult guy not to like, even.

But all that was until he laid his eyes on Flint and began to question his entire existence. First of all, it did not make any sense: Flint’s lyrics were _terrible_ , and Silver was extremely judgemental about such things. Second, Flint wasn’t even a particularly good singer, if you could call a bunch of grunting and a whole lot of shouting “singing.” Plus, Silver hadn’t entirely understood where they were even going with the whole Ambien Walrus thing, except to be as irreverent as possible while making a whole lot of culturally eclectic noise. They were a bit like a mixture between Gogol Bordello and the Beasty Boys, only somehow much more aggressively gay.

Because make no mistake: Flint was _extremely_ gay. There was no doubt, he really _needed_ the world to know exactly how much he loved cock of all shapes and sizes. His lyrics oozed with explicit salaciousness that would’ve come off as crude and off-putting coming out of anyone else’s mouth but Flint’s. (The British accent probably helped.) But oh, that lush, beautiful mouth. It had taken over all of poor Silver’s waking dreams and many of his sleeping ones as well.

And where did he even get off being so attractive? The man was a god damn ginger, for fuck’s sakes! It was unprecedented!

Silver had no idea what had finally filled him with enough courage: the music, the emotional high from the audience, the bourbon in his hip flask, or simply the one second it took for him to lock eyes with Flint. Whatever it was, it was propelling him straight towards the back door, with the other groupies, all hot and bothered for a glimpse or a feel of their favorite punk rockers.

It wasn’t going to be easy, he would have to face the Cerberus at the door, for one thing - the man entirely unironically named Gates. Now, Gates may not have been the fiercest of bouncers Silver had ever seen before, but, Silver had to admit, the all-seeing eye tattoo on the back of Gates’ freshly shaven head did have the desired intimidating effect.

“Is Arms gonna come out to sign autographs?” A heavily eyelinered girl pushed her way to the front of the line.

“Go home, love,” Gates replied, patiently. “No one is doing autographs tonight.”

_Shit_. Silver took a step back from the crowd as a rumble of complaint went up. Was that it? The night that he'd finally girded up his loins to come out here and not a chance of seeing Flint?

Then, through the chainlink security gate, he caught sight of something white underneath the tour bus.

Was that... a poodle?

Thinking quickly, Silver untied his jacket from his waist, pulling it on and twisting his hair back out of his face. The roadies had already started to bring stuff out, so he caught up the nearest black zippered bag and took a deep breath.

_Walk with authority. Act like you belong._

"Pardon me, I'm late. Excuse me - thank you - could you get the gate?"

Gates caught hold of him just as he'd managed to worm his way to the front of the crowd. "Hold it. What the hell are you doing?"

"My name is John Silver, I’m here from the groomer. Got caught in traffic. But if you'll excuse me I should be able to get done by the time you get on the road."

Gates' bushy eyebrows lowered. "The groomer."

"Yes." Silver leaned closer, lowering his voice. "Poodle groomer."

"Oh for fuck’s...." Gates grabbed the gate himself, shooing Silver in. "Go, go. For god’s sake, don't keep him waiting."

And just like that, he was inside.

Silver slipped around the tour bus and safely out of sight of Gates, dropping the bag on a pile of equipment. Would Gates follow up on his story? What if he actually had to try and groom a dog? Possibly he could muddle his way through it except for the fact that he didn't actually have any grooming tools. At least he was a dog person, or inasmuch as they seemed to enjoy to slobber on him and he didn't mind the slobbering.

The front doors to the tour bus were open, along with the luggage compartments, but for the moment there was no one in sight. No one, except the fluffy white poodle who'd given him his in. Bright black eyes in a mop of white curls turned to him, tufty ears perking. Then it bounded over, jumping up against his calf excitedly. "Well, I suppose this is better than standing around awkwardly," Silver said to the poodle, bending down to give the dog the attention it demanded. It was rather cute, he decided. And only a little slobbery. And... humping his leg.

"Hey, now! I promise you my leg cannot have puppies!" He tried to step back while keeping his hands on the wriggling, joyful animal. "Hold on, hold on. I'll pet you as much as you like, just please try to stop humping - "

"I don't suppose you'd like to tell me what you're doing with my dog?" said a voice, words curling around Silver like thick butterscotch.

Silver looked up, eyes moving past a very familiar crotch, up a black button down and into the slightly bemused face of his latest wet dream. For a moment all he could do was stare, mouth dry, words momentarily deserting him. Then Flint's eyebrow rose higher, and in a sudden panic Silver realized he needed to do _something._

He put on his best, most winning grin, stepping up to Flint boldly. "My name is John Silver, and I am going to suck your cock."


	2. Mr. Flint

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because you begged so pretty ;)

For a few moments that felt suspiciously like an eternity, Flint’s face did nothing but accumulate furrow by furrow, bunching up in the middle of his forehead in a growing frown. His eyes narrowed upon Silver’s face and his jaw clenched, pushing out against his cheekbones.

Then, Flint’s hand traveled up to stroke over the hairs of his perfectly groomed beard with his thumb and index finger. “Athos! Get on the bus!”

“You must have misheard,” Silver stuttered, “my name is…” Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a dash of white as the poodle who had been sexually assaulting him bounded onto the bus behind Flint. “Oh. _That_ is Athos.”

"Indeed. Fortunately, he likes you. I, however, haven't made up my mind about you yet. But I'm willing to give you a trial."

“What would he have done if he didn’t like me?” Silver asked, internally cursing his inability to hold his tongue. Perhaps he should have led with the “trial” thing, instead of the doggy talk.

Something rather resembling a crooked smile settled into the corner of Flint’s mouth. “Let’s just say he has a vicious streak.”

“He’s a poodle,” Silver pointed out.

“Yeah? Don’t tell _him_ that.”

"I'll certainly take that into account." Silver wet his lips, hoping that Flint's crooked smile meant he hadn't completely ruined his chances. "So, about that trial....?"

That was how Silver found himself being dragged up the steps of a tour bus that, in hindsight, probably cost twice as much as his apartment. He took brief note of the couches strewn with various articles of costume and the take-out boxes piled in the galley, as well as the large dog kennel under the table with... dear god, was that _three_ poodles? Flint bent to latch the crate door. Then he was dragging him past a wall of bunks and into a small room at the back of the bus. He stopped to grab a single white sock off the floor that was gray with dust bunnies, stuffing it into the outside door pull and sliding it shut.

Well that was an encouragingly universal sign.

In the dimly lit space, which was decked out in flickering lights only vaguely reminiscent of Christmas decorations, Silver spotted a rather large bed. He wasn’t sure what he had been expecting. Of course, if the rumor mags were true, at least three of the members of Ambien Walrus were an item. _Together_. And it was true that threesomes required proper space to maneuver…

“You still with me?” Flint’s voice brought Silver out of his contemplations.

“Oh, yes, sir,” Silver replied, wetting his parched lips with his tongue.

Flint emitted a soft chuckle and pushed him backwards onto the bed. “You don’t have to call me ‘sir’,” Flint said, crawling onto the bed after him and discarding the leather coat he had been wearing onto the floor. “Unless you’re into that sort of thing.”

Silver's cock answered before he could think about it, and he grinned. "Well," he said, stroking his hands over the hips of Flint's ripped jeans and pulling him closer, "I suppose that depends on whether _you_ are into it." He watched Flint's eyes darken and Silver arched up to draw him into a kiss. He lowered his voice, not attempting to hide his desire. "Are you into it... Sir?"

Flint's hips bucked against his in response. "You talk a lot for someone who's supposed to be sucking my cock," he growled, but pinned Silver back to the bed, returning his kiss with a fierce hunger, all tongue and teeth and heat.

The sensible argument that he couldn't suck Flint's cock while his tongue was down his throat quickly faded, along with pretty much every other thought that wasn't _Holy fuck, yes._ Silver couldn’t believe it, even with Flint’s entire weight pressing down upon him, suddenly overcome by the scent of his stale cologne and cigarettes and whatever else conspired against Silver’s senses to render him wild with pure lust. How was it that Fortune had favored him this much? Silver bucked upwards, into the heat of Flint’s body, his fingers caressing the closely cropped bristles covering Flint’s skull, loving the way the hair tickled his fingertips. _Holy fuck. Yes._

“Take off your clothes,” Flint purred into the skin of Silver’s neck, right below his earlobe, and a violent pulse of desire shot directly to the very tip of his straining cock. “Wanna see you,” Flint added, his hand already crawling into the waistband of Silver’s jeans, to pull out the shirt that had been tucked inside.

Silver would be lying if he said he hadn’t imagined this moment before, dozens of times, maybe more. In no version of even his most brazen fantasy did James Flint ever look down upon him with eyes burning like coals, and demanded to _see_ him. He swallowed and quickly began to wiggle out of his t-shirt, thanking the gods for the cover of darkness and hoping Flint wouldn’t notice that it sported the Ambien Walrus logo right in the middle. But hey, if you’re gonna try to fuck the band leader like a groupie, you might as well dress like one! He tossed the t-shirt to the floor, where it pleased him to note it landed right on top of Flint’s infamous leather coat. With any luck, he'd go home still smelling like Flint.

Silver arched his hips off the bed as Flint yanked at his jeans and boxer briefs, managing to shimmy them down far enough that he could kick them off. Flint's own jeans were far less obedient, damp with perspiration from the show and clinging tightly to his body. Silver was certain he was going to tear the tattered things beyond wearability even for Flint, but Flint didn't seem to care, yanking frantically at the fabric.

Then there was nothing but skin and heat and the exquisite hardness of Flint's cock pressed into Silver's stomach, sliding against his own as Flint thrust hard against him.

"Better," Flint growled, then pulled back, and Silver found himself caught again in the heat of that gaze, sweeping down the length of his body as if he could devour Silver with sight alone.

Silver forced himself to breathe, sucking in the night air in the vain hope that it would cool the desperate desire that smoldered in his core. He gave Flint a smile that he hoped looked more confident than he felt. "Do you like what you see, sir?"

For a moment Flint didn't answer, but shifted to kneel between Silver’s thighs, pulling them up to rest over his own. Flint's cock nestled against the side of Silver's balls, and he rolled his hips against him slowly as he stroked his hands up the inside of Silver's thighs, fingers tracing the lines of his hips. "You pass," he murmured, then leaned down to draw a lick up the underside of Silver’s cock.

Somewhere in the middle of watching Flint's lips part over the head of his cock, Silver's brain short-circuited. An embarrassing noise escaped from his throat, half overwhelmed, half incredulous, and though he tried to protest that Flint certainly didn't need to feel obligated to blow _him_ , all that managed to come out was a garbled, "You really - fuck!"

If his lack of eloquence bothered Flint, Silver certainly couldn't tell - or at least wasn't in enough of a right mind to do so. The only thing that registered was Flint's mouth on his cock, hot and wet and eager as it slid down his shaft. Flint's groan thrummed through him, his fingers digging into Silver's hips as he swallowed around him, and, before Silver could gather his thoughts back together long enough to take stock of his situation, he was coming thick and hot down Flint’s throat, hips stuttering up into the mouth of the sexiest man on the planet.

Fortunately, Flint's muffled groan sounded nothing but pleased, swallowing around him again, continuing to suck him through the bliss of his orgasm and the aftershocks, until Silver had to pull back, spent and oversensitized. _Don't apologize_ , he told himself firmly, trying to ignore the burning heat of shame and mortification that was spreading across his cheeks. "Jesus Christ, you're amazing," he breathed, forcing his voice to keep steady. "I don't suppose you'd like to come up here and fuck my mouth in return?"

Flint, who had been licking a wet stripe along the line of Silver's hipbone, gave a huffed, surprised laugh against his skin. He pressed a wet kiss to Silver's stomach, then smirked up at him. "That's one hell of an invitation. I don't mind if I do."

 _Holy fuck. Yes._ Silver groaned as Flint continued to lick his way up his body, sucking and biting at his skin along the way. Then, his lips were over Silver’s, prying them open, molding against them, his own taste penetrating his senses from the back of Flint’s tongue. _James Flint swallowed my load_ , Silver’s brain screamed in lustful agony, and he moaned into the other man’s mouth, trying to taste all of it, attempting to commemorate that moment to his memory so that it could keep his bones warm when old age and decrepitude set in. 

“Look at you,” Flint whispered against the corner of Silver’s mouth, sliding his thumb past Silver’s lip and pressing it down against his tongue. “So eager to get a faceful of my cock.” Flint’s thumb stroked up and down Silver’s tongue gently, chased by the tip of Flint’s own tongue as it played along the seams of Silver’s lips.

“God… _please_ ,” Silver begged with unrestrained abandon.

“So pretty when you beg for it,” Flint’s words were barely a breath whispered against the flushed skin of Silver’s neck. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. Gonna give it to you.”

“Thank… thank you..,” Silver stammered, leaving his jaw hanging slack as Flint removed his thumb and scooted up towards the head of the bed, until his thighs were braced against Silver’s armpits. Flint’s cock rose proudly from the enticing triangle of his groin, thick, firm and dripping at the tip. In the darkness, Silver could not help but wonder whether it was flushed red to match the thick tufts of curls from the root of which it had sprung. Silver salivated at the mere thought. He reached out with reverent fingers to wrap around Flint’s shaft and guide it into his waiting mouth.

Flint’s hand tightened in Silver’s curls as his cock slid, velvety and warm, towards the back of his throat. Silver’s fingers settled into the grooves of Flint’s hip bones, loving the smooth feel of his heated skin, the thick cords of muscles as they flexed and moved against the palms of his hands, and encouraged Flint to thrust forward, swallowing eagerly around his cock. Silver closed his eyes and allowed his other senses to guide him. Regretfully, the darkness had not allowed him to see Flint’s skin better. Many a night had he lain there, wondering exactly what those patterns of freckles would look like along the expanse of his thighs, along the dips above his ass. Now, Silver could feel and taste Flint. His entire being was becoming suffused with eau de Flint and he expressed his gratitude by moaning lustily around the thick cock that filled his mouth and stretched out his lips.

Never in his life had Silver wanted someone to appreciate his substantial cock-sucking skills more. He wanted, he _needed_ Flint to remember this, the way he knew he himself would be reliving these brief moments later on when he bit the pillow and jerked himself off with enough ferocity to give himself calluses. 

Flint was a taste of heaven against his tongue: the weight of his fat and veiny cock, the heady aroma of his arousal, accompanied by soft moans that Silver’s ministrations pulled out from him, filled Silver with a glowing sense of satisfaction. His own cock was rapidly hardening against his own abdomen again, despite his earlier embarrassing sprint to the finish. He allowed Flint to thrust all the way in, holding him close until he was so choked up that tears began to streak out of the corners of his eyes, hoping his fingers would leave marks of remembrance on that freckle-spattered skin. At that moment, Silver preferred Flint’s cock to the very air or the act of breathing. Flint’s hips stuttered; he inhaled sharply and attempted to pull back. Instead, Silver swallowed around his swollen shaft and held him steady as Flint’s balls pulled up and he began to unload burst after burst right down Silver’s throat.

Flint slid down next to him, his body lazily sinking against Silver’s side, his arm coming to wrap across Silver’s ribcage, as he pulled Silver into a slow, insistent kiss, as if wanting to taste all of himself on his lips. If all of Silver’s bones had already not turned to liquid, that final post-coital act would have undone him completely. Fortunately, he was quite beyond all rational thought, so he allowed himself to close his eyes and press into Flint’s armpit, if only to enjoy the aroma of the singer’s satisfied body a few moments longer.


	3. The Urca Prize

Flint woke up from a very physical, not at all metaphorical jolt, and immediately hit his head against something hard. “Buggery!”

“Mmmrrr?” something dark and curly purred against his side. Something, which, in the darkness of the Fuck Room, he couldn’t quite make out and had initially mistaken for a poodle.

“Aramis, how did you get in here?”

“Huh?” The mop of curls next to him rolled over and presented as having a human face.

“Oh fuck!” Flint grumbled and dove under the bed in an attempt to recover his clothes. “Why are you still here?”

Another jolt underneath them told Flint all he needed to know: the tour bus was on the way. He had no idea how long he’d been sleeping, having passed out in the back of the Fuck Room with the latest groupie du jour. Scratch that: groupie de la nuit. Flint reached up to open the blinds behind him and squinted at the penetrating light.

“Bugger! Fucking hell!”

How fucking long have they been on the road? Jesus! He wasn’t even particularly knackered last night. Hadn’t gotten the chance to finish his traditional post-show beverage when he spotted Athos staking his claim on some interloper in the parking lot. He’d looked down at the naked groupie at his side, who, despite Flint’s efforts, remained stubbornly asleep. Ah, to sleep the sleep of youth again! Flint cursed internally and cast a resentful look at the young man.

Then, he cast a longer look at the young man.

 _Damn_. Well, he was beautiful as hell, Flint had to admit and congratulate himself for banging that hot piece of ass the night before. He allowed his eyes to take in the kid’s face, almost cherubic in repose (although he certainly sucked cock like no angel), down the lines of his magnificent, long neck, sweeping along his well defined chest and washboard abs, lingering on his groin that lay there, soft and spent, against his slender thigh. How exactly had Flint gotten so lucky? He specifically asked Gates to allow no one in, didn’t he? How did this kid even get into the parking lot?

Flint reached out and dragged his thumb softly across one of the perky nipples that presented themselves to his admiring view. The nub hardened immediately beneath his touch. _Shit_. He needed to get rid of this kid.

He made his way carefully out of the Fuck Room, stopping by the toilet for a mandatory piss, and then walking past the bunks into the galley, and kneeling by the dog crate. On the couch, Max and Anne were curled up around each other and what looked like the remnants of his bottle of Glenfiddich. Little thieves, he chuckled to himself. He undid the latch and was immediately mauled by the only curls he actually welcomed into his life unabashedly.

“Good morning, you naughty children,” he greeted the poodles who circled him intent on making sure that every part of him got properly licked. “Did you miss daddy? Yes you did! Yes you did!”

Picking Porthos up into his arms and scratching behind her floppy ears, Flint made his way towards the front of the bus.

“Where the hell are we, DeGroot?” he asked the driver, rubbing the remains of sleep out of his eyes.

“Ohio,” the driver replied, pointing to a bright green highway sign just as they passed under it.

“How the fuck…” Flint muttered and was immediately licked by Porthos right in the mouth. “We gotta make a pit stop before these little fuckers piss themselves.”

“Hold them out the window?” DeGroot suggested.

“What? No! That’s child abuse!” Aramis, in particular, would not appreciate having his coiffure ruffled in such a rude fashion.

“You afraid of a fine or you don’t wanna cause an accident?” DeGroot pressed on.

“Look, just… let me know when we can make a stop, all right?”

“The fuck’s _your_ problem?” Anne’s voice carried over from the galley. “Sexed us out of the fucking Fuck Room for the whole night, now acting like your panties are all in a bunch.”

“My apologies if you ladies had to resort to public snuggling,” Flint retorted, sinking down on the couch next to Max and prying the bottle out of her relaxed fingers. He took a long swig and allowed the fine single malt beverage to spread warmth throughout his body. “You could’ve woken me before we left.”

“The sock was on the fuckin’ door! You always respect the bloody sock, right?”

“Would’ve solved a problem for me,” Flint explained, ruefully.

“Yeah, what kinda problem?” Anne sneered.

Flint shook his head and rummaged around for a pack of his cigarettes. It was too early in the morning for trading sexcapade stories, as Billy’s raucous snores from the upper bunk informed him in no uncertain terms.

“You’ll see soon enough,” Flint mumbled as he opened the window and lit up a smoke.

~~~

Waking up in a strange bed wasn't actually strange. He'd slept in enough cheap motels during the course of following the Ambien Walrus tour that all strange beds had begun to blur into one average memory of discomfort. Hard, cold, smelly. This strange bed, however, was abnormally comfortable.

It was also... vibrating?

Silver cracked open one eye and tried to place himself. Whatever tiny hotel room he'd crashed in was barely illuminated by small cracks of light coming in through built-in window blinds. Then the smooth vibration of the bed shuddered and jerked and the familiar motion jogged his mind fully awake.

Bus. He was on a tour bus. He was...

 _Holy shit_.

Had last night actually happened? Part of him couldn't help but think that it must have been nothing but a wet dream born of too much whiskey. But why the hell would he be on what was obviously a very swanky tour bus otherwise?

He was alone, though that was somewhat of a relief. The last thing he wanted was for Flint to see him falling all over himself as he tried to come to grips with the realization that he'd - that he'd....

Sitting up on the bed, Silver allowed himself a single silent fist pump, grinning madly into the darkness of the bedroom.

Then, he started on the much more difficult task of trying to find his clothes. Flint’s coat appeared to be gone, which meant his t-shirt could be anywhere. Silver dove under the bed on a Hail Mary and felt his way around until his hand clutched over worn cotton. He shook loose the dust and the… fuck, probably poodle hair, and was just about to pull the shirt over his head when his eyes caught the logo.

Silver groaned softly to himself, cursing his poor decision making. Who the fuck wore a concert t-shirt TO the band's concert? Never mind that had seemed like an awesome idea at the time and been the only thing clean in his suitcase.

His suitcase. _Shit._ Turning his t-shirt inside out, Silver pawed ineffectually at the blind, trying to figure out how to make it go up. Finally he gave up and just tried to peer out the gap, only to see... nothing. Corn fields. Road.

In the back pocket of his jeans, his phone buzzed to remind him of its presence. Thank god for small favors, and his decision not to spend the concert filming video. He thumbed it to unlock.

_**Muldoon:** hope ur someplace fun and not passed out in a gutter. should I bring ur shit to oh?_

For a moment Silver considered the text. Ohio had been their next destination. Logic stated that, given his surroundings and the time of morning, he was likely closer to there than his luggage. _Please,_ he texted back. _I owe you one._ He could explain the rest of... of whatever this was to Muldoon when he saw him.

The bus shuddered again, beginning to slow, which left Silver with another conundrum. Leaving whatever cosy bedroom he'd had his magical experience in meant possibly facing the rest of the band, which he wasn't quite sure he was ready for. On the other hand, leaving the room meant getting to take a badly needed piss, and possibly even getting to see Flint again...

At last, the bus rumbled to a stop. Silver heard the low murmur of voices through the door, followed by a chorus of excited yips. Then everything fell quiet.

Bathroom, his bladder told him firmly. Along with various other sundry needs. Fortunately the cabin of the bus appeared to be empty. The first narrow door past the bedroom lead to the pisser, and Silver quickly ducked inside, relieved to have escaped notice for a little longer.

Had he not been already doing so, the firm pounding that came on the bathroom door would have made him shit himself. "Jack, hurry the fuck up! Some of us can't piss in the bushes and I'm sure as hell not using that disgusting gas station!"

 _Shit_. So much for escaping notice. Silver wiped hurriedly, shimmying his skinny jeans back up his legs and just barely managing to avoid dropping his phone in the chemical stew. There was water, thank god, and he shoved his hands under the faucet, running them through his curls to dry them while simultaneously fumbling with the door lock. "Sorry, sorry - "

The blond woman on the other side of the door stared at him, eyes narrowing. "Who the fuck are you?"

Silver's mind quickly reviewed the band. Arguably, he was usually too distracted by Flint to pay much attention to the other members, but he was fairly certain this woman wasn't one of them. Another fan? She looked quite a bit cleaner than most of the people he'd met on tour. Cleaner, and substantially more scary.

“I’m…” he started, awkwardly stepping aside to clear the way to the toilet. “I’m with Flint?”

The blonde’s eyebrow elevated at a sharp angle. “You’re what now? Let me see your fucking ID.”

“My ID? Why?” Silver spat out, offended.

“Because _I’m_ the one who has to clean up Flint’s bloody cock-ups, now hand it over so I can see how big of a _cock_ -up this one is!” She held out her hand, her other hand resting militantly over her hip.

“Hey now, I’m legal!” Silver objected, nevertheless fishing out his wallet and handing her his driver’s license.

“John Silver?” The woman read his name out as if it was the most offensive thing she’d ever heard. “Go fuck yourself,” she said, handing the license back and pushing him out of the way as she locked the bathroom door behind her.

“Well, that went well,” Silver whispered to himself, still entirely unsure who exactly he had just shared that encounter with.

At the sound of steps on the stairs of the bus, Silver whirled. Fortunately this person he did recognize from the band, the doe-eyed accordion player. She smiled as she beheld Silver, starting down the aisle of the bus towards him but veering off to bend down and open... was that a refrigerator?

"So you are the reason I was forced to sleep on the couch last night," she said, still smiling, and straightened to hold out a bottle of water towards him. "I'm Max."

Silver winced. "Sorry. I didn't know - I didn't mean to - ah, I'm Silver, I - "

Max laughed, wiggling the bottle. "Drink, _mon petit caniche._ After a night with Flint, you surely need it."

"Thank you." Silver uncapped the bottle, drinking deeply as Max settled into the booth, pulling her legging-clad legs up under her to avoid the crate under the table. "I'm somewhat afraid to ask, but... where are we?"

“Bowling Green, Ohio.”

Before Silver had the chance to react to this news, a man in the smallest and queerest sunglasses he had ever seen alighted into the bus with a spring in his step and a smile on his lips that rapidly froze upon beholding Silver.

“Darling?” The man addressed Max. “It’s not even noon yet and you already have guests over?”

Silver began to recognize the bass player, if only by the extremely pointed side burns. “Calico” they called him. Jack Calico?

“He’s with Flint,” Max replied with a smile and an eyebrow wiggle.

“Bloody hell,” Jack groused, collapsing onto the couch next to Max and draping his arm over her shoulder. “Has anyone ever told you that you have a very obvious type!” he hollered through the opened doorway of the bus. Silver had to assume this comment was intended for his ginger god.

“He’s a fucking stow away is what he is,” a fiery redhead pronounced, shooting Silver a look of disdain, as she climbed onto the bus and proceed to collapse on the other side of Jack, who hastened to put his available arm around her. Anne Bonny, the lead guitarist, Silver realized and choked. She was _fantastic_.

“And what the fuck is he still doing here?” The blonde reappeared, her hair neatly tied into an upswept bun. “I thought I told you to get lost.”

“Well, actually,” Silver lifted his finger, “You told me to go fuck myself…” He sounded a lot less terrified than he felt, or so he had hoped.

“I like him,” Max pronounced and Silver exhaled a breath of relief. "And in any case, we can't just leave him in the middle of nowhere, Eleanor."

“Bowling Green is hardly middle of bloody nowhere, Max,” the blonde - Eleanor - protested. “It’s a university town. I’m sure they have a Burger King he can hang out at.”

“He’s Flint’s guest, Flint should decide if he stays or goes,” Max shrugged and looked towards Jack and Anne, seemingly for support.

“Your shirt’s inside out,” Anne pointed out, helpfully, and Silver cringed.

Before he could reply, Eleanor leaned out the bus door and hollered “James McGraw, you get back here this instant or I’m leaving you and your fucking poodles behind!”

“It’s bad luck, they say,” Anne muttered, scowling in Silver’s direction. “Where my dad’s family comes from, they say means you’re gonna get _spanked_.”

“Good lord, darling,” Jack snorted and leaned over to kiss Anne on the cheek. “Where is your old man’s family from again?”

“Russia,” she replied. “The cold part.”

“Jesus,” Silver muttered and shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “I didn’t realize Bonny was a Russian name.”

“Changed it,” Anne shrugged.

“From what?” Silver ventured.

“Used to be spelled B-O-N-I-N.” Anne’s lip curled upwards in such a way that dared Silver to sound it out. He did so only in his head and then graced her with his most disarming smile.

“That’s a great story, Ms. Bonny,” he concluded.

Anne gave a satisfied nod. "Least this one's not a dumbass."

Silver was just about to gloat inwardly and take many mental pictures which he could later share with Muldoon. Anne Bonny thought he wasn’t a dumbass. That was practically like being _liked_. Then he heard something scrambling at the steps to the bus, and seconds later the small white fluffball from the night before was cannonballing across the floor to him, excitedly jumping up onto his calf and... humping.

“Oh dear,” Max laughed, “he thinks you’re a poodle too.”

“Don’t listen to her,” Jack interjected. “That thing humps anything that moves. Especially the little black poodle. You’ll see him in a second.”

Indeed, Silver did see a flash of black shoot across the bus and attach itself to his other leg, joining the white poodle in a little game of synchronized humpage.

“Athos! Aramis! Bad boys!” Flint’s voice sent a jolt of desire right into Silver’s jeans, making them even tighter. He absentmindedly pet the little black poodle on the head as the furball let go of his calf. The little white poodle, Athos, immediately jumped off as well and mounted the little black poodle instead. “You fucking exhibitionists,” Flint smiled at the canine pair fondly. “Back in your crate, boys!” Flint ushered the poodles inside, as the third poodle, currently lounging in his arms and sporting a pink bow on top of its head, was slow to follow in.

“Band meeting!” Eleanor hollered. “Flint, sit your ass down. Jack, wake Billy the fuck up! Mr. DeGroot, get us on our way. Let’s go, people, let’s go! _You_ ,” she pointed at Silver, “go sit in the back of the bus and shut the fuck up! And if you repeat anything you hear on this bus to anyone I'll sue your ass so hard you'll wish you were a Taylor Swift fan!"

With the sudden, chilling realization that this blond bundle of fury had seen his address, Silver tucked himself into the other side of the booth. He'd already had quite enough attention for one day.

~~~

Flint was grateful to Eleanor for keeping everyone focused on what was important. If for no other reason than the fact that it meant he didn’t have to deal with his little problem, currently in the back of the bus, looking kind of goofy with his smeared guyliner and the inside out t-shirt. Flint had hoped it was due to the fact that he had fucked his brain out the back of his skull the night before, if he was being entirely honest.

“All right, guys,” Eleanor was saying, “the press is saying this is our year. We have already got the nomination for rock band of the year, and now we have three months to impress the fans with something _quality_. Remember, half the votes for the Urca Prize come from the public. That means we need to engage them! We need to connect with them!”

“We need to take off our clothes, like VANE?” Anne scoffed and a wave of chuckles rippled throughout the bus. Fucking Charles Vane, Flint snarled just thinking about him.

“I know we have a history with Charles,” Eleanor continued.

“Nah man,” Arms shook his head. “ _You_ have a history with Charles. I thought he was fine as our lead. No offense, man,” he nodded towards Flint.

“None taken,” Flint lied through his teeth. He had grown to like Anne and Max, he had even grown to tolerate Jack, Billy “Arms” Bones though - he was still on the fence about. Too tall.

“Say what we all like about Charles,” Eleanor continued as if Arms hadn’t spoken, “he knows how to connect with the audience. His lyrics are _passionate_.”

“ _Oh Eleanor, my love, your love fits like a glove, you are my turtle dove, come down from high above_?” Max quoted and mimed inducing a session of vomiting with two of her fingers.

“It made it to number 15 on Top 40!” Eleanor defended her former paramour.

“Well, people are generally idiots,” Flint shrugged.

“How are we ever supposed to win the Urca with lyrics like _Fuck the Queen, right in her fucking mouth, fuck the Queen, and her greying South_???”

“I like that one,” Arms nodded. “It has a great drum solo.”

“You’re welcome,” Flint fist bumped the man. Perhaps he wasn’t _that_ tall.

“You’re all insane!” Eleanor threw up her hands. “We need a better song. And if you’re incapable of writing one yourself, perhaps we can get someone else to do it.”

“Who?” Flint shot up, angrily.

“I don’t know. I’ll ask fucking Sia!”

For a moment, Eleanor and Flint stood chest to chest, and Flint finally had to admit to himself that this was not a staring contest he could easily win. “And that’s not all,” Eleanor continued, pushing Flint back onto the couch with one dainty finger. “ _Behavior_ , people! Do you know how Urca Prize winners behave? Well, let me tell you how they do _not_ behave.” She bent over to reach for the magazine rack, and leafed through an issue of Rolling Stone until she found what she was looking for. “Jack, if you please. You have a lovely voice for declamation.”

Jack cleared his throat and commenced to read the article from the place Eleanor had pointed out.

“While Ambien Walrus certainly has elevated their game by introducing innovative orchestration to their numbers, most of the focus has lately been on their lead singer’s inability to control himself in public. It is quite a propos and revolutionary to burn the Union Jack onstage, but it is entirely different when you tear shirts off the chests of unsuspecting populace as they walk down the street and set them aflame in the local trash can.” Jack took a pregnant pause and looked at Flint.

“It was just the one time,” Flint muttered, biting his lips. “I was drunk.”

“When are you _not_?” Anne grinned.

Jack continued, “Shocking as Mr. Flint’s behavior may seem, it is well matched by the temperament of his bandmates. In particular, the lead guitarist, Anne Bonny, who had gotten into a knife-fight in a local pub following a show in Pittsburgh, over a perceived affront against the band’s accordion player (rumored to be her girlfriend) Max Nassau.” Jack stopped and looked towards Eleanor. “I protest. That was entirely called for!”

“Damn right,” Anne echoed.

“How daft are you?” Eleanor exploded. “You’re lucky that trucker didn’t press charges!”

“It will be interesting to see,” Jack went on, “whether the band can pull off what none of the other nominated bands this year have yet been able to achieve: a number one single. Having said that, the Urca has been won in prior years by rock bands of much less talent than the Ambien Walrus, and as of today their lead competition appears to come from a former bandmate, Charles Vane of VANE. We will all be here, waiting and eating the popcorn, as the hunt for the Urca continues.”

“Fuck whoever wrote that!” Anne snapped.

“Yeah, man,” Arms added. Flint looked at him askance. Arms wasn’t a man of many words, but he was a man of quite exceptional arms.

“Fine then,” Eleanor proclaimed, veering upon Anne. “ _You_ can fuck whoever wrote that! _I_ am gonna find a god damn award winning songwriter willing to work with a bunch of homicidal nutbags, so that _you guys_ can get your shit together and _win the bloody Urca_!!!”

With this almost Amazonian battlecry, Eleanor turned sharply and headed to the back of the bus. “Why the _fuck_ are you still here!” she yelled at Silver as she disappeared behind the screen of the Fuck Room. Something told Flint she had not gone in there to masturbate.


	4. Captain Kidd's

The rest of the ride to Columbus passed like a dream. No, truly, he was living the dream. Silver even had to pinch himself a few times just to make sure he wasn’t, in fact, asleep. Even though he barely moved from the back of the bus, except to take another leak, and that one time Anne shouted at him to fetch her acoustic guitar so she could jam, Silver had never been more enthralled.

He got to watch Flint. Breathe the same air as Flint. Listen to him talk, for hours. Exchanging witty repartee with Eleanor, taking the piss out of Jack, arguing with Max about the virtues of a formal, classical musical education. At some point, the dog crate was unlatched, and Porthos shuffled over to sniff at Silver’s shoes and then curled at his feet: an act which seemed sufficient to detract his other would-be canine molesters from humping him again.

When the bus finally pulled to an abrupt halt, Silver was jostled out of his reverie and looked at the clock on his phone. His battery life showed 8%. Just enough to text Muldoon to come pick him up.

Eleanor, who had spent the last portion of the ride glued to her own phone, scrolling through Instagram (Silver wasn’t snooping, he just happened to see when he walked by), rose from her seat, a general about to command her troops.

“All right, ladies and gentlemen! Using the term loosely. We’ll spend the night at this fine establishment tonight.” She pointed to a Holiday Inn outside. “Get checked in. Get some rest before the show. We’ll meet up after at Captain Kidd’s Pub for some drinks, which according to Yelp are terrible, but we should be able to have some privacy there.”

“Yes, Ma’am, Captain Guthrie!” Jack afforded her a mock salute.

“Don’t forget your instruments,” Eleanor added, patently ignoring him. “And your poodles, James.” She cast a derisive look towards Silver. “All four of them.”

Anne and Max giggled, earning a snarl from Flint.

So, this was it then. The end of the road. Silver’s heart sank. And he was just starting to get used to the idea of a life on the road, taking care of his man’s every need, especially all his needs below the belt. He licked his lips again, as if trying to savor the taste of the previous night. He unfolded himself from the booth seat, then stood, trying to ingrain the moment in his memory - the feel of the bus settling after the long trip, of Porthos' tail hitting against his calf. Flint, standing to pull something down from one of the bus's bunks, his t-shirt riding up to give Silver a tantalizing glimpse of the roll of muscle that ran down along his hip and into his jeans. Without thinking, he adjusted his crotch.

Then he realized Flint was staring at him, one eyebrow arched.

Silver grinned in automatic, embarrassed response. _Say something. Say something and don't sound like an idiot._ "Thanks. For the ride. And, um. Everything else."

Flint gave a noncommittal grunt, shouldering what looked like an army duffel and heading for the front of the bus. He patted his own thigh as he did, sending all three poodles scurrying after him.

Silver tried not to feel disappointed. But what had he expected Flint to say?

Then Flint stopped at the top of the stairs, looking back to him. "Well? Grab the kennel and come on."

 _Holy shit._ Silver quickly yanked the dog kennel free from between the booth seats, nearly falling backwards as it came free. "Coming! Coming. Yes."

 _Change of plans,_ he texted to Muldoon. _Give me an hour._

~~~

"An hour? Do you know how long I've been down here?" Muldoon had a stack of dirty styrofoam coffee cups beside him, wedged between two threadbare couch cushions. "The clerks have been giving me dirty looks since three fifteen!"

"What time did you get here?"

"Three-oh-five!"

Silver waved away the complaint, tugging him off the couch. "Nevermind that. Let's get out of here so I can tell you the best shit you've ever fucking heard. And... I know where we're drinking tonight, after the show."

~~~

Flint thought he did a particularly great set, especially considering he spotted that curly haired kid in the crowd halfway through the show and had to do the rest of it with a raging boner. Taking him back to the hotel to go a few extra rounds prior to setting him loose upon unsuspecting humanity had been an excellent idea, even if it had meant breaking his self-imposed rule of “Thou shalt not fuck the same groupie twice, lest they start getting Ideas.” He couldn’t tell whether Silver had gotten any such aforementioned Ideas into that curly head of his, but he did know that Silver could do things with his tongue that would embarrass a flautist. The kid was truly gifted, and on that front, at least, Flint had no regrets.

He smiled privately to himself as he sat in the a darkened booth and slowly sipped his well-earned pint of Guinness.

Everything was going precisely to plan.

He hadn't set out with aspirations of spending the prime of his life yelling obscenities from the stage at a horde of unwashed, screaming masses wearing too much cheap eyemakeup. But it had been the easiest and most obvious way he'd been able to concoct to achieve his aims. He remembered the passage that Jack had read from the Rolling Stone with a deep sense of satisfaction and accomplishment. Perhaps he should keep a closer lookout for wankers with the Union Jack on their clothes. That, and...

That, and take the fucking Urca.

Finishing the remains of his Guinness, he moved on to Jim Beams, letting the stronger liquor sink into his bones like a tonic. At the bar, Max and Jack were several glasses deep, giggling like schoolgirls, Anne interjecting something every so often with a sardonic smirk. Arms, who always seemed to drink and never seemed to get drunk, sat too tall on a tall bar stool, watching them, quietly content.

Bunch of assholes, Flint thought. But they were his assholes, after all.

Then, over the buzz of the bar and the random background music, his ears picked up the most distinctively pretentious rasp he'd ever heard... and would have been completely content to never hear again.

“The fuck’s _he_ doing here?” Anne was the first to rise from the bar and come chest to chest with Eleanor, who had just appeared from the loo, looking markedly disheveled and accompanied by a cancerous growth on her ass that suspiciously resembled Charles Vane.

“Now, now, let’s all be civil,” Eleanor placated and added in a heated whisper, “Remember what we discussed regarding _behavior_!”

“Control your dog, Jack,” Vane droned out. “I wasn’t the one who invited you lot to my favorite bar.”

“You twat!” Max spat at him. “Your favorite bar, eh? You don’t even live in Columbus!”

“Everyone knows this is my favorite bar when I play Columbus,” Vane puffed out his chest, which, as per usual, was sweat-slicked and unnecessarily exposed as he had appeared to have forgotten to rebutton his shirt. “It’s common knowledge. All over my Instagram!”

“Guys, please!” Eleanor attempted again.

“You horndog, El!” Anne continued without backing down. “You wanted to come here on purpose, hoping to pork this pig!”

“Seriously, El?” Jack chimed in. “Stalking an old flame on Instagram? This is low, even for you.”

Flint snorted, observing it all with as much detachment as he could muster, notwithstanding his rather considerable personal dislike of Charles Vane of VANE.

“What can I say?” Vane smirked. “A bitch in heat is a bitch for my cock.”

“The fuck did you just say?” Flint rose from his seat.

“Charles!” Eleanor turned sharply and landed a loud slap across Vane’s smug face. “Sit down, James. I don’t need you to fight my battles for me.”

“He has no right to talk to you like that,” Flint stated, feeling every muscle in his body tense in anticipation of an attack.

Vane laughed and ran his hand through his long, greasy hair that probably hadn’t been washed in weeks. “You always did have daddy issues, Eleanor, but _him_?” he said, pointing at Flint.

It was then that Flint punched the asshole right in his asshole face.

~~~

"I take it back!" Muldoon yelled, ducking behind his chair as what looked like a glass sailed through the air to smash on the wall of the bar behind him. "This place fucking rocks!"

Twenty-four hours previous, Silver would have been inclined to agree. How many times had he gone for drinks at some scummy bar after a concert, hoping that fate would somehow put him in the same place as the band? Even with his insider knowledge of their destination, his heart had still skipped a beat when he and Muldoon had stepped into Captain Kidd's and seen the members of Ambien Walrus seated at the bar. They'd found a table off to one side where they could catch a drink and see both them and the small booth near the back where the tall ginger drink of water Silver had spent the afternoon with had tucked himself.

Even when the appearance of that Vane asshole had quickly escalated into a fight, the Silver of twenty-four hours ago would have been thrilled. After all, how many times in one's life could you witness a truly epic bar fight? But that was before he'd spent the morning on Ambien Walrus's tour bus. Before he'd heard about the Urca Prize.

"You don't understand, this is terrible!" Silver winced as Anne Bonny somehow broke a chair over... who the hell was that? Arms had picked some dude up and threw him out the window, Max and Eleanor were yelling at each other as Jack tried to mediate with quickly growing impatience, Charles Vane had ripped his own shirt off and was working on Flint's, and Silver was quite certain that the bartender was on the phone with the cops.

He grabbed Muldoon's arm. "Listen to me. This is what we're going to do."

~~~

Flint swore as someone's shove sent him reeling, crashing over a bar table as it toppled. Had that been fucking Vane, or one of the other random bar patrons who'd stuck their noses in his goddamn fight? He spat blood on the floor, ignoring the fact that more dripped on his nose. He'd get that fucking poser, he'd -

"Christ, it's the cops!" Rackham, who was sporting a quickly purpling eye, yelled from where he stood near the broken window.

"Fuck!" Flint stabbed a finger to where Vane was reeling by the bar, shards from a shattered bottle in his hair. "This is your goddamn fault!"

Then, as if out of nowhere, his curly-haired sex toy popped up at his elbow. "Come with me, quickly!"

Flint stared. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

"Keeping you out of the slammer!" Silver hissed. "Come on!"

And somehow, Flint was far too astonished to argue. He found himself towed behind a booth and through a service door, into the chaos of a kitchen (had there been a diner next door?) and out the back door as the kitchen staff shouted complaints at their retreating forms. In the back parking lot he was surprised to find Arms stuffing Anne into the back of a truck bed as she yelled obscenities at him.

"I don't fucking care if she told us to go, I'm not leaving her!"

"Max will be fine, god! Haven't you seen those tits?"

"Of course I've seen those tits, you bloody fuckwit!"

"Nevermind that, get in!" Jack, apparating through the backdoor of the building, took a running dive into the truck bed behind them. Flint found himself shoved into the passenger seat with Silver on his lap. The back slammed as the tailgate closed, and then the truck was peeling away from the parking lot, rattling ominously as it approached 50 MPH on a residential road. It appeared to have been driven by a stumpy, bald man with strange head tattoos.

"Who the fuck are you?"

"The poor schmuck who listens to this guy's great ideas," the driver replied with a smirk.

Flint craned his neck to look behind them, fully expecting the telltale flash of a squad car. Somehow the road stayed dark, the lights from the cars at the front of the pub fading into the darkness. Soon, the truck was calmly pulling up in front of the Holiday Inn as if it wasn't harboring fugitives from justice.

He was almost regretful when Silver's very nice ass slid off his lap and out the door.

"Thanks," Flint said quietly as he followed. "I mean that. I'd ask you to stay, but I might have to spend the night scrounging up bail money for my manager."

"Aw, that's ok." Silver lowered his head, grinning. "Just had to help. I'll be rooting for you guys, you know. For that award. You really deserve it."

A flash of red puffed past them on the sidewalk. “Babe? Are you all right? Is El with you?” Sounded like Anne had made contact with Max after all.

Flint smiled carefully. “Even though we don’t have a number one hit single?” He didn’t know why he bothered with the small talk at all. There was a part of him that wanted to drag the kid upstairs and have him perform oral miracles on him for the duration of the night. There was a bigger part of him, however, that was aware of his own age, and knew he needed desperately to pass the fuck out and ice his face. Perhaps not in that order.

"It'll happen," Silver insisted, clearly having far more faith in Flint than Flint did himself. "I'm certain of it."

Flint gave a non committal hum, nodding, glancing towards the hotel and the retreating forms of his bandmates as they started inside. Then he stepped close to Silver. ".... you going to Chicago?"

Silver's eyes widened, after which Flint could tell that he was trying futilely to regain his cool. "Oh hell yeah! I - um, I mean it's on our road trip, so... I should be there."

Flint nodded. "I'll tell Gates to keep a lookout for the dog groomer, then."


	5. Poetry in Motion

Spending the night in the Fuck Room with his girls put Jack in a substantially better mood by the time they had arrived in the Windy City than when they left Columbus. It was true that, being a man, his modus operandi was to pass out immediately upon reaching completion, whereas Anne and Max both seemed somehow energized by their orgasms. But he was generous of heart as well as cock, and did not begrudge them whatever it was they did once he was safely away in the arms of Morpheus.

Jack yawned, shifted around a bit, mostly to dislodge Anne’s hand from his ass (what exactly _did_ they get up to while he slept?), and quietly shuffled out into the galley. Not surprisingly, everyone else was awake. Eleanor and Flint were playing a very militant game of UNO, each one with a poodle in their lap. Arms was seated in the back of the bus, grimly staring at a piece of paper in his hand, intermittently rubbing his eyebrow ridge as if it made his brain hurt.

“What you got there, Billy?”

“Oh. Hey Jack.” Arms folded the piece of paper into a something resembling a tightly rolled joint. “Fuck if I know. I sorta need eye bleach now. Along with brain bleach.”

“Aha, well!” Jack reached out towards the piece of paper. “Now I must see this for myself. Give to Daddy.”

“Fuck you, Jack.”

“It’s not yours,” Jack bristled. “What gives?”

Billy appeared to contemplate Jack’s point for a few more moments. Then, making a great show of his resignation, he shrugged and handed the piece of paper over. “Knock yourself out.”

“Thank you.” Jack unrolled the paper and looked at what appeared to be a hastily written poem, scribbled on the back of a napkin in a shaky ballpoint pen. Whoever had done this, had obviously done so while the bus was moving.

_Drops of heaven on my tongue_   
_Taste of summer rain_   
_God it has been far too long_   
_Let me taste your pain_   
_Thrust inside me_   
_Come again_   
_Fill me with your sin_   
_I can’t wait till we’re alone_   
_I will let you in._

“Holy fuckballs,” Jack pronounced and glanced over at Arms again. “You didn’t write this, did you?”

“You think I wrote a poem about sucking some guy’s cock?”

“Well, it’s not explicitly about sucking some guy’s… look who’s all judgemental this morning!”

“I’m not judgemental, I just didn’t write it. You _know_ who must’ve done it!” Billy’s eyes shifted over to where Flint was attempting to demoralize Eleanor, to no avail.

Jack laughed. “No fucking way. That’s not his style. This… this is… downright poetic. If Flint had written it, it would’ve gone something akin to… I’m gonna fuck your throat, your entire fucking face, and then I’ll come all over you, fuck England!”

“Point,” Arms admitted with a shrug.

“Whoever wrote _this_ ,” Jack squinted at the napkin in his hand again. “Well… he’s a poet. Or she, I suppose.” A dubious look traversed between the two men. “A bigger poet than Flint, anyways.”

Jack considered the napkin, and then his options. Finally he dropped it over Eleanor's head, onto her cards. "I think this is one of the girls'," he said, knowing full well that it was neither Anne nor Max's style, despite their occasional penchant for strap-ons. "Think it has merit?"

Eleanor grabbed at the napkin before Porthos could eat it. "On a napkin?" Then she froze, staring at the wrinkled, makeshift parchment. "Dear god."

Over the top of his cards, Flint raised an eyebrow. "Have you found the next _'Wrecking Ball'_?"

Eleanor's eyeroll was particularly scathing. "And _this_ is why we have yet to land at number one."

"Well fuck you too, princess."

"No, fuck _this_." Eleanor turned the napkin with a flourish, setting it neatly down on top of a wild draw 4 card. "This. This is our number one."

"Leftovers."

"Read it, fuckhead!"

Flint leaned closer, lips pursing. "... erotic leftovers."

"Oh fuck off, Flint!" Eleanor turned in the booth to look up at Jack. "Tell me where you got this. It's not from the girls, I'm not an idiot."

“Arms found it,” Jack shrugged, hiding a complacent grin. “Ask him.”

“Billy?" Eleanor peered back towards their drummer thoughtfully. "And here I thought you were just a pretty face and a pair of fantastic arms."

"Hey!"

"And here I thought you were a breeder," Flint added with a smirk.

"It's not like I wrote the bloody thing. I almost blew my nose on it for chrissakes!"

"Well," Jack started, pushing aside the urge to join in the razzing to declare his sudden and brilliant realization aloud, "I suppose it must have been that poodle you picked up in Detroit."

~~~

It was not, Silver reflected, the best Ambien Walrus show he'd been to. The band was excellent, of course, but despite lining up three hours early he'd only managed to end up in the second row in front of Flint, a position that he was quickly jostled out of by two scraggly-haired meatheads who were more interested in slamming their heads together than actually listening to the fucking music.

He should have gone with Muldoon, who was probably sitting comfortably up on the balcony drinking a cold beer instead of half covered in a warm one. But part of him hadn't been able to help but think that if he just got close enough to catch Flint's eye again...

Bitterly, Silver swallowed down a wave of longing. He had to stop thinking about the possibility of going to bed with Flint again. No matter how earth-shattering it had been, he knew he'd only be having delusions of grandeur to imagine that Flint would possibly want to seek him out again. And the sooner he accepted that, the sooner he could go back to enjoying the show.

Frowning, he tried to peer over the thrashing fuckboys. A few people had pushed their way out of the pit during the break before the encore; maybe he could find a spot on the rail in front of Max. It wouldn't be Flint, but...

Then, as he shouldered his way into a gap between concertgoers, he felt a hand close around his arm and yank.

Gates. _Shit._

"You're that poodle groomer, yeah?" Gates had to yell to be heard over the whining distortion of Anne's guitar. "Come with me!"

For a terrified second Silver considered the possibility that he was being kicked out and banned for life, and was about to deny everything. Then he realized that Gates was towing him not towards the exit, but to the stage door. His pulse quickened.

Maybe things weren't so hopeless after all.

Silver found himself pulled through the heavy door, blinking in the sudden flickering fluorescent light as it slammed shut behind them. "Wait here," Gates told him firmly, pushing him into a gap between two wheeled gear crates as if they were a holding pen for him. Then he was down the hall and out of sight.

Silver's eyes followed him, then took stock of the hall, crowded with gear. Behind him, a steel rail covered in sharpie graffiti and flaking paint edged the side of a ramp that ascended up to a set of double doors, behind which he could hear the muted power chords that closed out "Tea Time for Cunts". On a good night he'd be flying high on adrenaline and the euphoria on the crowd, surging to the angry pulsing music, hanging on Flint's every word as he closed out the concert. Something deep inside him yearned for it. But with any luck, perhaps... perhaps he'd close out the night with something far, far better.

The door at the top of the ramp flung open, clanging against the rail, the roar of the crowd and crunchy distorted guitar filling the hallway. Then Flint was storming down the ramp, his tattered, open shirt flapping behind him and leather pants pulling across his thighs as he moved. Like a god, Silver thought, already half hard. Thor, crackling with lightning, alive with sound and fury.

"You!" Flint's pace quickened, and he hopped the rail halfway down. Then Silver was being slammed back against the riveted metal gear case, Flint's fingers tight in his hair and his tongue down his throat. It was as though Flint's entire form was infused, charged with the frantic energy of the stage, thrumming against Silver, hot and sweat-damp. He shoved a thigh between Silver's, cock grinding into his stomach as he thrust against him, hard and demanding.

"Jesus Christ, Flint!"

"Ah, fuck." Flint turned towards the voice, and, dazed, Silver followed his gaze to see the blond woman from the bar. Their manager, he remembered, striding quickly down the hall with Gates behind her.

"Fuck that," Flint growled. Then he grabbed at the case behind Silver, hauling at it and pivoting to send it wheeling down the hall towards the approaching pair. Before Silver could question, Flint's hand was around his waist, pulling him out the fire exit, the door blaring complaint as they exited.

"What - " Silver tried helplessly, but before he could catch his bearings he was in the back of someone's car, peeling away from the venue.

"She can have you when I'm done with you," Flint said, claiming his mouth again, and all the questions in Silver's mind evaporated as all the blood in his body quickly rushed south.

The remains of Silver's propriety warred with the very real and immediate fact that Flint, in very tight leather pants, had apparently kidnapped him with the intention of getting him naked as soon as possible. Flint's hands pushed between the car seat and Silver's ass, squeezing and pulling him closer. Silver's fingers curled in the back of Flint’s shirt, and he fought to hold back a moan as Flint's teeth bit at on his bottom lip. Fortunately the car they were in stopped before he could break any decency laws, and soon Silver was in another Holiday Inn, being towed down a hall and into a room remarkably like the one Silver had last been naked in with this god among men.

Flint's green eyes narrowed, dark and predatory. "Bed. Now."

"Naked?" Silver offered tentatively, tugging the bottom of his t-shirt out of his jeans.

Flint snorted. "Obviously." He stalked forward as Silver took a stuttered step back. Hopefully towards the bed; he couldn't turn to look, not when Flint was currently unbuttoning the fly of those delightful leather pants. He swallowed hard, pulse fluttering against his eardrums, caught between arousal and nervous excitement. Flint had been passionate before, of course, but that was nothing compared to this - this triumphant gladiator, stalking forward to claim his prize.

Flint’s nostrils flared, his lush lips parted, and Silver saw the pink tip of his tongue press against his upper teeth. “I’ve been thinking about you, John Silver,” Flint spoke, his voice a deep rumble in his chest, and Silver was afraid he was going to lose his bowels from the sheer excitement of it. “Been thinking about fucking you. So hard you walk with a limp for the next three days.”

“Jesus Christ,” Silver muttered, his knees hitting the back of the bed.

“Now, does that sound like something you’d be interested in?” Flint pressed closer and Silver fell onto the bed, losing all sense of coordination. “Say it.” Flint bent over Silver’s prone form on the bed. “I need to hear you say it.”

“ _God_ , yes, sir. I really fucking need you to fuck me.”

“So hard you can’t see straight?”

“So hard I forget my own name,” Silver managed, congratulating himself for being able to produce so many words at such a moment. They might, in fact, be his last words, he suspected. It was very possible he would not survive this latest encounter with Flint’s beautiful, fat cock.

With a growl, Flint pulled Silver’s t-shirt over his head, leaving it tangled around the wrists as makeshift restraints. Silver gasped and eagerly wrapped his legs around Flint’s hips. His body was very much on board with the entire proceedings, even as his brain screamed in agony and disbelief.

“Mmm, you look good like this. All trussed up for me to _fuck_.”

A rather embarrassing sound escaped Silver’s mouth as it opened and instinctively reached out towards Flint. He wanted, needed to be filled, in every orifice, and as soon as possible, before his brain exploded. Flint smirked down upon him, his hands tightening around the waistband of Silver’s jeans and yanking them down his narrow hips and legs. His own fly stood long unbuttoned, but infuriatingly encasing Flint’s engorged cock which strained against the leather. Flint straightened up only long enough to palm his own dick as he bit his own lower lip and admired his handy work. Then he pulled Silver's thighs from around his waist, pushing his knees up to his chest. "Stay like that."

Thank god he wasn't one to skip abs day, Silver thought, pulling his knees higher. 

Then Flint, grabbing a small bottle of lube from the bedside drawer, drizzled some over his own fingers before leaning over Silver and capturing one of his nipples into his mouth. Silver unleashed an outpouring of obscenities and arched off the bed, nipple chasing Flint’s lips as they left him, teasingly bereft and exposed to the cool air as Flint’s saliva cooled against his skin. 

“No fair,” Silver muttered, just as slick fingers traced over his balls and taint, coming to rub circles around his hole. “Please…” He was definitely not above begging. “Please, sir.”

“God, you’re pretty,” Flint mumbled, his eyes unfocused and dilated in lust. His finger breached Silver’s opening, screwing in slowly but surely as his other hand pressed up against one of Silver’s spread thighs, pushing it back against Silver’s chest. “Fuck, look at your tight, little arse. I could pay a motherfucker to paint a picture of it, I swear.” Before Silver could summon a clever response to this statement, Flint added a second finger, and then bent down and latched his teeth over a meaty and tender part of his buttcheek. Silver emitted a squeal and his ass clenched tightly around Flint’s fingers. “So hungry for it, aren’t you, baby boy?” Flint smacked Silver on the same spot where his teeth doubtlessly left a very telltale imprint.

“Fucking hell, you know I am!” Silver growled back, unable to control himself anymore. He was afraid if this impossible foreplay continued a moment longer, he might embarrass himself again by coming too soon. 

Thankfully, Flint appeared very much on the same page by then. Pushing his leather pants down his hips and finally extricating that same cock that Silver was only too happy to choke on a few short days ago, Flint grabbed Silver by the hips and pulled him to the very edge of the bed. Silver heard the rustling of a condom wrapper being torn, and then his fingers dug into the mattress and he sucked in a breath as he felt the first prodding of the head of Flint’s cock against his hole. He gave a small prayer of thanks that Flint had taken the time to stretch him because as thick and magnificent as that cock had felt in his mouth, it felt doubly as challenging slowly breaching his ass.

“All right?” Flint asked, hands sliding up past Silver’s knees and settling around his ankles as he placed Silver’s calves over his broad shoulders. Then Flint’s hands slowly trailed down again and settled over Silver’s hips. A whimper was all the sound of approbation Silver could muster. To emphasize his point, he clenched around Flint’s cock and attempted to fuck himself deeper with it. “Oh _fuck_ , you’re so tight,” Flint panted as he began to move slowly inside Silver, each thrust picking up power and momentum.

For Silver, it was as if each push of Flint's cock enslaved him, forcing the air from his lungs, pushing pleasure up his spine. This was far, far beyond the pleasure of the concert, far beyond anything he'd ever felt before, being the sole and complete focus of Flint's intensity. Flint's hips pressed against his ass as he plunged inside to the hilt; his fingers dug into Silver's hips to hold him in place as if to bury himself inside him completely.

"Yes," Silver gasped, as if nothing in the world would be better than completely belonging to one James Flint. "God, please...."

"Jesus fuck...." For a moment Flint's fingers were painfully tight on his hips, stuttering hard into him, each thrust jarring Silver's body. Then he was leaning over him, bending him almost in two to claim Silver's mouth, sucking and biting at his lips and tongue between gasps for breath. "How are you so goddamn fuckable?" He gasped, moving harder. "So fucking tight around my cock, baby,...!"

"Just made for you," Silver gasped, euphoric at the idea, drunk on pleasure, drunk on Flint's words. "Fuck me whenever you need, sir, _god_ \- !"

Flint made a choked, needy noise, stealing Silver's cries with kisses as he went to town, bucking up into him hard and fast. In moments, Silver was coming apart completely, crying out into Flint's mouth as everything around him that was not the pleasure of Flint's cock and the ecstatic knowledge of Flint's pleasure faded to blackness.

They were both sweaty now, Silver thought idly as he caught his breath. Part of him was vaguely aware of Flint manhandling him up into the bed, then sliding under the covers beside him. Naked, he registered with a soft wave of satisfaction. Naked was good.

Flint's breath tickled his ear. "I'm gonna fuck you again when you wake up," he purred, throwing an arm around Silver’s waist. Like a seatbelt, Silver thought sleepily. Very responsible.

Clearly he had no choice but to stay as long as Flint desired. What a terrible hardship. "Mmm," he murmured, trying to stay awake long enough to form a reply. "I’ll have your sin again."


	6. The True and Dolorous Tale of Athos and Aramis

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay it is time for some NOTES! Those of you who have happened to intersect with us in *cough* another fandom *cough*, will doubtlessly recognize what is happening in the following chapter. For the rest of you, we must confess that, yes, this is a very direct and non-subtle homage to a certain scene in Dumas' _The Three Musketeers_ (only with 100% more poodles). It was inevitable that we cross fandom streams! Wish we could say we were sorry, but it was too ludicrous a ploy not to utilize! 
> 
> So, here: enjoy some more ridiculousness to take you through the first batch of the holidays!

Silver awoke to the sound of the violin and a stream of sunlight that beat mercilessly against his eyes, even through shuttered lids. He stirred, stretching, and turned his head towards the window, where he beheld an outline of Flint’s back in sharp relief against the onslaught of morning light. It took a few more moments to realize that the sound of the violin was also coming from Flint and Silver lay transfixed as he watched the bow caressing the strings. Silver held his breath; this music was somehow familiar yet foreign, tinged with melancholy and longing. He wanted to ask Flint what the piece was, but he also did not wish to break the spell that the rocker seemed under as he played.

Silver had previously had opportunity to see Flint play the fiddle during Ambien Walrus shows. On those rare occasions, he played it with the same rough vigor and gusto that he did everything else, tearing the strings on his bow mercilessly as the music spun in a wild crescendo. He’d heard that Flint had been classically trained, of course, but rumors were rumors for a reason, and rumors about Flint’s mysterious past were a dime a dozen.

Flint finished the piece, lowered his bow, and remained with his back to Silver for a full minute longer, as if listening to inaudible applause. Then, very slowly, he turned, placed the violin back in its case, and walked back to the bed, finally allowing Silver’s eyes to focus enough to see he was still naked.

“Looks like someone needs a poodle groomer this morning,” Flint smirked, nodding towards Silver, who ran his fingers through his wild and tangled post-coital curls and blushed deeply.

“We can’t all look hot with a shaved head, you know!” he retorted, trying not to pout too much.

“You think I look hot?” Flint raised an eyebrow.

“You think I only like you for your music?” Silver snapped back, still feeling self-conscious about his unruly hairdo.

Flint crawled into the bed, laughing, fingers combing through Silver’s curls in an attempt to tame them. His eyes fell to Silver’s lips as his fingers brushed all too gently over his ears and then tugged, to pull him into a soft kiss. Silver’s heart gave a desperate jolt inside his breast and he threw one arm around Flint’s thick neck, pulling him closer. He reveled in Flint’s soft humming against his lips, until the rocker pulled back with a satisfied smirk.

“Remember what I promised I’d do to you when you were awake again?” His thumb drew across the seam of Silver’s mouth and Silver couldn’t help but open up and take that wandering appendage in between his teeth, stroking the soft pad with his tongue. “You _do_ remember,” Flint breathed against his ear. 

Silver was already subsumed by another tidal wave of lust. “Wait,” he pulled back, reluctantly. “What did your manager want with me last night?”

“Nothing that can’t wait a few more hours,” Flint promised, pushing Silver backwards onto the pillows that were still warm from their shared body heat.

“If you say so… Sir.”

~~~

“You want me to write a what now?”

“I want you to write a rock ballad,” Eleanor explained with uncharacteristic patience. Flint smoothed down his mustache and beard and awaited the inevitable refusal.

“And who is going to sing this rock ballad?” Silver inquired with bulging eyes. “ _Him_?” he nodded at Flint. Flint snorted.

“Well, generally speaking, he is the lead singer of our band.”

“He can hardly sing!” Silver protested.

 _Wait a minute_ , Flint took a militant step forward, his fists clenching. “Excuse you!”

“If you don’t like his singing, why you fuckin’ him?” Anne chimed in from the windowsill, where she had been filing her nails and pretending to pay no attention at all while subtly observing the entire proceedings from beneath the rim of her favorite hat.

“You musicians really are full of yourselves, aren’t you?” the curly upstart had the nerve to declare.

“Well, to be fair, you _are_ fucking him,” Eleanor pointed out.

“A man can find another man bangable without actually admiring him as an artist, you know,” Silver continued, adding to Flint’s growing list of reasons to murder him. “Shallowness, for one.” 

Flint wasn’t sure whether to feel insulted or complimented. He felt suddenly used and manipulated and wondered if this was how his groupies felt once he’d sampled and discarded them. 

“I admit,” Silver raised both hands up, “I am not above shallowness. Or, for that matter, vainglory. I mean, fucking the coolest rockstar in town is a great feat for a suburban boy like myself.”

“Stop talking,” Flint barked out, unable to contain himself any longer. "And if you don't care for our music, get the fuck out while you're at it."

"I didn't say that!" Silver waved his raised hands. "Your music is superb! You all play incredibly well to your talents, and the fact that your vocals are primarily growling and swearing is perfectly suiting and perfectly sexy!"

"He can sing," Eleanor said evenly, "no matter how much he tries to convince the world otherwise. He can sing, and you can write," she continued, growing angry now, "and together you could create something truly remarkable if you'd just stop being a couple of pigheaded motherfuckers for one goddamn moment!"

"It would be particularly satisfying to shove Vane off his pedestal," Jack pointed out from where he was perched on the dog kennel, ignoring the fact that Porthos was rolling on top of his shoes.

"That's true," Flint agreed, begrudgingly. He watched his newest fucktoy consider the proposition. As much as the boy's accusations had riled him, he couldn't ignore how convenient it would be to have him around.

"So... I could write whatever I wanted?"

"Within reason," Eleanor agreed. "Anne has a composition in the works. You'd have to work with her."

"And it can't be complimentary to England," Flint added, just in case Silver had been getting ideas. 

“All right,” Silver appeared to consent, tentatively. “Now, let’s discuss my fee.”

Inexplicably, once more Flint felt the mounting desire to murder the kid.

~~~

Being hired to write lyrics for the band he'd been following across the country should have been a dream come true for Silver. Except now that he had actually negotiated himself a place with Ambien Walrus, the talents which had gotten him there had mysteriously evaporated.

Flint had been his Muse. But now that Eleanor had hired Silver to take over songwriting from Flint, the object of his affections seemed a lot more likely to punch him than fuck him.

Silver stuck the bedraggled end of his bic pen between his teeth, considering the situation. Flint had been so completely magnificent when he'd been on stage, storming off to kidnap him for sex. And holy shit, had the sex been amazing. That was what he needed to get Flint back to - triumphant and dominant and rearing to rip his clothes off. 

But how? He had a feeling that Flint wasn't one to be swayed by idle flattery. And Silver had said some fairly idiotic things about the man's musical talents - not that his own were any better at the moment. He sighed, ripping the page of drivel from his notebook and tossing it into the wastebin.

It had been April, one of those rare months when the air outside was neither too frigid nor too humid to breathe, and Silver forced his window open, hoping the fresh air would do him some good. Ambien Walrus still had one more show to play in Chicago, and Eleanor had sprung for his hotel room at the same Holiday Inn as the rest of the band. He was family now, she’d assured him, casting cautionary glances at Flint. 

“Like a stepchild, more like,” Jack had cut in. No one had contradicted him.

Silver leaned against the windowpane and closed his eyes, hoping to summon back the same creative juices that had so beset him on the bus ride from Detroit to Columbus. Instead, he heard the sound of a violin, wafting through the air, rising up from below him. Flint must have also had his window opened. Silver sat up from a sudden flash of an idea. Flint must be alone in his hotel room.

Perhaps a peace offering of alcohol would lead to just the "inspiration" Silver needed.

Twenty minutes later he was outside Flint's door, nervously clutching a brown paper bag with a bottle of Glenfiddich - that was what he'd seen Flint drinking on the tour bus, wasn't it? It certainly seemed appropriately badass. 

He couldn't hear the violin anymore, but surely it wasn't so late that Flint would have gone to sleep. Taking a deep breath, he raised a hand and knocked.

There was shuffling on the other side of the door, followed by a long pause before Flint’s voice sounded as if from the Great Beyond. “Fuck off. Do Not Disturb means do not fucking disturb.”

“I’m not room service,” Silver responded with much more bravado than he felt. “And I brought booze,” he quickly added.

The door opened a few inches and Flint’s emerald eyes shone through the crack. “I can buy my own bloody booze, thank you very much… oh!” His eyes fell on the bottle. “I’ll take that.” His hand reached out and yanked the Glenfiddich out of Silver’s hand. In another moment, the door would slam in his face. Throwing all caution to the wind, Silver shoved his boot into the door.

“You really shouldn’t drink that alone.”

“You really shouldn’t be putting your foot there unless you want to lose it,” Flint threatened in an even voice that was simultaneously chilling and arousing.

“Come on,” Silver leaned against the door. “You have to admit, this entire situation isn’t quite as much my fault as you’re making it out to be.” Flint stared at him in silence, but at least he did not slam the door on his foot. “Eleanor is right, you know. We would be much better off as partners than as… whatever the fuck you’ve convinced yourself we are.” He softened his voice. "All I want is to help the band. I swear. I'd love that to also include swallowing your cock whenever you feel so inspired to let me, but that's up to you."

Did Flint's eyebrow twitch? Before Silver could question his decision the door slid open, and Flint stalked over to the room's small table, grabbing up two glasses on the way.

"I suppose," Flint said slowly, pouring a generous portion of the Glenfiddich into both glasses, "that since I'm stuck with you I might as well make the most of it." He settled into the chair, somehow managing to make even an upright hotel chair look like an irreverent sprawl, his feet up on the bed.

Silver settled into the other chair carefully, taking a sip of his drink and trying not to cough from how strong it was. "I'm not that bad, am I? Anyway, I'll write something fitting for you. Heartfelt and badass and punk all at the same time."

Flint's lips curled as he took another sip. "Just no sympathy for fucking England."

"Yes, I did gather that much. With the whole flag burning and everything. Anyways, what do you have against England?” Silver asked, brushing a stray curl behind his ear in that way that he hoped came off as both disarming and charming at the same time.

Flint’s brow darkened, a shadow passing over his features as he took another long swallow of his drink.

“England? Nothing personally, of course,” he replied with a crooked grin that was closer to a scowl. “Now… my poodles, on the other hand… They… have something against England.”

“Your poodles?” Silver scratched his head in disbelief. “Athos, Porthos, and Aramis have something against England? What is it? Are they still pissed off that Cromwell beheaded Charles I?”

Flint’s mouth curled upwards in an ugly snarl. “You want me to tell you a little story? About Athos, Porthos, and Aramis?” His eyes clouded over and the way he bared his teeth made a cold shiver run up Silver’s spine.

“If you don’t mind..,” he said, carefully. He was scratching at the door of something here that he was not sure he knew how to perturb. It was better to exhibit caution.

“Well, you see,” Flint began, pouring himself another drink and throwing himself back into the chair, feet lifted back up onto the coverlet of the bed, “Athos here… he comes from a very old and noble stock. His parents were very important peop…. Poodles, you know, in the poodle community.”

“Uh huh,” Silver lifted both eyebrows and pushed his glass towards Flint. He suspected he would also need a refill for this story.

“One day, when Athos was just barely more than a puppy, he met Porthos and Aramis. Now, Porthos and Aramis were married to each other. I mean, so to speak. The idea was to breed them together, that’s what I mean.”

“Right,” Silver concurred and took a long sip of his drink.

“But it so happened, that Aramis wasn’t really interested in girl poodles. And neither was Athos. So…” Flint gulped down the rest of his drink.

“Your poodles are gay,” Silver attempted to help.

“You noticed?”

“I…” Silver wasn’t sure what to say. “Are we still talking about your poodles?”

“Of course we are!” Flint snapped.

“What happened then?” Silver asked, schooling his facial expression into one of rapt attention.

“What happened then was that Athos and Aramis became involved in this torrid love affair. We’re talking completely intoxicated and consumed by each other. Utterly inseparable.”

“What did Porthos think about this?” Silver prodded.

“Well, Porthos loved her husband very much and wanted him to be happy.”

“That’s very enlightened of… her?”

“Porthos is a first rate fucking poodle, okay?!” Flint barked and looked over to the kennel, where the three poodles were snuggled together in perfect sleepy harmony. “So anyways,” Flint continued when he saw no further protest from Silver, “one day, as I suppose was inevitable, Athos’ father walked in on him and Aramis in bed… I mean, you know, humping each other.”

“Daddy poodle wasn’t pleased about this?” Silver asked, biting his lips.

“No, in fact, he was fucking furious. It was bad enough that his son was involved with another man… poodle, but a married one at that! Well, he wasn’t going to let that one stand.”

“Why did he care so much?” Silver asked, genuinely appalled at the revelation.

“It would have been a great embarrassment, had it got out,” Flint explained. “Like I said, Athos’ father was a very high-standing… poodle.”

“A standing poodle, right.” Silver downed the rest of his drink and motioned for another refill. He wasn’t sure he was going to survive this conversation. “But I mean… how high-standing was he?”

“He was the bloody Leader of Her Majesty’s Most Loyal Opposition!” Flint exclaimed with a sudden burst of laughter as he downed his own drink and refilled his glass. “May he rot!”

Silver bit his tongue. “Fuck…”

“That’s right, my young friend. Fuck.” Flint saluted Silver and tossed back this latest of his drinks, immediately reaching for a refill. “Now you understand that daddy poodle couldn’t have his baby poodle running around shoving his dick in other boy poodles. But Athos wasn’t some kind of a _fucking coward_ and he had no plans to break things off with Aramis! So, what do you think daddy poodle did?”

“I… I don’t know….” Silver admitted, casting worried looks from Flint to the sleeping poodles.

“He _paid_ Aramis to break things off with Athos. And, it just so happened, that Aramis and Porthos had been in quite a bit of debt, and a substantial cash infusion was a more welcome addition to their lives than a Lord’s son.” 

“That’s awful, Flint!” Silver gasped out in genuine horror.

“That was the day I… Athos resolved that if his father didn’t want to be embarrassed by him, he would go out of his fucking way to be as embarrassing as humanly… fuck it… possible. He wanted every single thing he did to set his dear dad aflame. So. There you have it. Fuck England!” And with these words, Flint tossed back the rest of the bottle.

Silver opened his mouth and immediately closed it. He looked over at the poodles once more, then back at Flint, prudently not mentioning the obvious fact that all three poodles were sitting right there and very much together. He needed time to process this information, and from the way Flint had been looking at him, he had doubts about his capacity for much processing in the near future. He rose from the chair, pretended to stumble, then fell onto the bed, giggling like a teenaged fangirl. 

“I’m really drunk right now, Flint,” he lied. “But that’s a hell of a story.” 

He closed his eyes and immediately pretended to fall asleep. The sound of footsteps told him that Flint had walked over to the bed and had been standing over him, likely in contemplation.

“Kids these days _really_ can’t hold their liquor,” Flint muttered, and then collapsed onto the bed next to him.


	7. Things That Piss Off England

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well friends, in the face of 2016 being a motherfucking DICK, we turn to one of the few pure(?) things in the world we have any say over: Disgusting and Ridiculous Pirate Porn.

Silver woke up to insistent, long licks all over his face.

“Flint, you kinky fucker,” he groused, wrapping his arm around Flint’s neck and running his fingers through his curly… hair? “Oh my god, Athos! Have some shame!”

“He likes you,” Flint muttered from somewhere on the other side of the pillows.

“I thought he liked Aramis,” Silver retorted, immediately biting his lips, even as his mind was flooded with memories of the conversation from the previous night. “I mean… you know, they’re always... humping each other?”

“They need to be walked,” came Flint’s quiet, resigned reply, and then the bed shifted and Silver suddenly found himself bereft of the furnace that had been keeping him warm all night. Flint did give off quite an extraordinary amount of body heat. Even fully clothed, as they had apparently fallen asleep, after polishing off that bottle of Glenfiddich. “Listen, Silver…” Flint’s voice was uncertain as he loomed over the bed, rubbing the back of his head in a rather sheepish yet adorable fashion. “I may have said some stuff to you last night when we were drinking. About my poodles?” His hand nervously toyed with a leash that sported three leads on it.

“Did you? I admit, I can’t hold my liquor as well as you,” Silver lied. “I cannot recall half of what we spoke of.”

Flint gave him a long look. At first, it appeared cold with disdain at the blatant prevarication, then softened and dissolved as Flint nodded. A smile of half-gratitude curved into the corner of his mouth.

“I’ll be back after their walk. Stay here, will you?”

Silver swallowed the lump he hadn’t realized his throat had been nursing.

“I’ll stay,” he replied, and burrowed deeper into the pillows. He could not stand the thought of Flint seeing him blushing just at that moment.

Silver didn’t know how long of a walk Flint’s pet musketeers required, but having freshened up and helped himself to some mediocre Holiday Inn coffee, he thought he might see if the Muses were upon him. He twirled a pen between his fingers as he stared at the hotel notepad before him. The blank page taunted him back. Eleanor had liked his post-coital pining. Having actually tasted the ambrosia of Flint’s cock on more than one occasion, the pining was at the moment somewhat subdued. However, the task remained. A rock ballad begged to be written.

Silver scratched behind his ear and decided to make a list.

Things That Piss Off England

  1. The French
  2. The American Revolution
  3. Throwing tea into the harbor
  4. Immigrants???



Well, that didn’t sound _particularly_ romantic. Or rocktastic, for that matter. He couldn’t very well have Flint sing about the Fourth of July, could he? Could he?

_You are fire… You and I are fire… You are my fireworks._

Um… okay? He could work with that.

 _I am the match and you’re the firework,_  
_We can start a revolution,_  
_Scream until the Earth awoke_.

Pathetic. Silver shook his head at himself. Still, he might be onto something with this whole fireworks thing. He bet the British hated fireworks. Maybe he could work the French into this too, somehow.

He had been so engrossed, he almost didn’t notice his leg being humped at all.

“Athos, god damn it!” He ran his fingers through the curls on the dog’s head and floppy ears while the canine smiled at him happily, mid-hump. “Can’t you ever say hello like the civilized gentleman your daddy taught you to be?”

“Don’t call me his daddy, fuck’s sakes,” Flint grumbled.

“Sorry, daddy,” Silver gave Flint his biggest shit-eating grin.

“Oh you’re…” Flint raised his eyebrow and clenched his jaw. “You’re asking for it, Silver.”

“What if I am?” Silver smirked, chewing on the cap of his pen.

Flint’s hand was curled in the front of Silver's shirt, pulling him to his feet until they stood chest to chest. “Still gagging for my cock, aren’t you, boy?”

“I ask not for myself, but for Art,” Silver retorted, leaning forward until he could pull Flint’s lower lip between his teeth. “I need to be inspired. Think of the song. Think of the band.” His hand cupped the comforting heaviness of Flint’s sack. “Think of… the Urca.”

Flint’s eyes lit up. “You want me to fuck you for the Urca?” he purred against Silver’s ear, a low, dangerous growl.

~~~

 

Flint should have been in a much better mood, all things considered. Spending the morning and much of the afternoon buried balls deep in the delectable ass of one John Silver had been a glorious undertaking, and normally would have been the best way to prepare for a show. Instead, the melancholy that had driven him to retreat the day before into retrospective thoughts and violin still lingered, compounded by the annoying vulnerability of having told Silver... told Silver about the _poodles_.

He grabbed someone's half-full plastic bottle of shitty ass rye off the makeup table in the green room as he paced back and forth, uncapping it and taking a generous swig. Then another. Inner confidence, he'd long ago learned, could be easily replicated on stage by copious amounts of liquor.

Seated at the counter, Jack looked up at him in the mirror, halfway through careful application of copious amounts of eyeliner.

“Looking at you,” Jack mused, “one would never know you’ve been getting your dick wet on the regular at all.” He glanced at Arms, over in the hairdresser’s chair. “Is that what they call it? Getting your dick wet? Doesn’t seem right if it’s going in the ass, does it?”

“The fuck are you asking me for?” Billy shot back without any obvious rancor. “Idelle, for fuck’s sakes, don’t make me look like Vanilla Ice!”

Flint’s lack of response was evidence enough of his utter obliviousness. They needed Flint either angry or horny for the show, not whatever the fuck emo shit that he was wallowing in currently.

“Perhaps you should get a cat?” Jack continued, undeterred. “I hear they lower blood pressure. But then again, you’d have to be okay with pussy, as a concept.”

"Fuck you, Jack," Flint growled, chugging back another swig of the rye to cover for his inability to produce the usual rancor. He tried to ignore the feeling of Silver's eyes on him from the corner of the room, knowing that if he acknowledged the boy that he'd see the same mix of adoration and sympathy that he very much did not want to have to respond to at the moment.

The door to the green room pushed open, filling the small space with the ridiculous noise of the opening band. Eleanor, lips pursed in annoyance, surveyed them. "You ready? Audience is going to eat these talentless hacks alive if we don't get out there soon." Her eyes fell to the bottle in Flint's hand, one brow raising. "You can fucking perform, can't you?"

"Of course I can fucking perform," Flint growled, clinging to the surge of annoyance her words rose in him. He pushed past her and through the door, chucking the bottle of rye at the wall for added effect.

The cheap-ass plastic fucker bounced.

Fuck.

Well, at least he could be pissed off about that.

It wasn't a terrible show, in the end. The shitty openers had done him a bit of a favor with their ineptitude. When he had given up his dream of playing Carnegie Hall for good, he never expected his audience would ever be discriminating enough to know any better. He had underestimated his audience. It almost made him question what Silver had said - about his singing ability, or lack thereof. Almost.

Well, what the fuck did Silver know, anyway?

By halfway through the set Flint was properly fuming, screaming obscenities at the audience, grabbing his own crotch, ripped t-shirt drenched with sweat under the heat of the stage lights. It was exactly the space that he needed to be in, the reason he kept coming back to this life night after night, beyond the need to stick it to his father. The roar of the crowd and the burn of his anger fed into a kind of euphoria, burning hot through his veins, better than any drug. Part of him wanted to stay there forever, feeding off the audience, ignoring things like musical prizes and beautiful young men with big blue eyes.

As they were nearing the end of the encore he caught sight of Gates in with the security before the barriers. He was trying to tell him something, but Flint was too caught up in the performance to care. "FUCK ENGLAND!" he screamed into the mic, thrusting his zippo into the kerosene soaked mass of the Union Jack that hung in the middle of the stage, then taking a run at the crowd to dive over the guards and the barrier into the surging, adoring mass of arms that caught him and held him aloft. It didn't last long - it never did - but in the moments before the meaty hand on his ankle hauled him back to safety nothing else existed but the physical, hundreds of voices united, sweaty hands moving him and tearing at his clothes and caring about absolutely nothing but the moment.

"Flint! I have to tell you - "

"Fuck off!" he yelled back at Gates as he scrambled back on stage, throwing the remains of his shirt into the audience (take that, Charles Vane!) as Anne and Jack banged out the final chords of the song, then striding off stage, nerves singing in satisfaction as the final crash of the cymbals and screech of guitar distortion faded.

Off stage, and right into the waiting form of one Miranda Hamilton.

~~~

“James!” the beautiful brunette threw herself into Flint’s embrace, her own long, white arms coming to wrap around his neck like two pythons. _What the fuck_ , Silver frowned and clenched his teeth so hard that his jaw hurt.

“Miranda… you’re here…” Flint’s voice was very soft, softer than Silver had ever heard it before.

 _Who the fuck is Miranda?_ It should have been _him_ with his limbs all over Flint after the show.

“Come on, lad,” Rackham’s voice pulled Silver from his thoughts. “Let’s give the lovebirds some privacy.” _Lovebirds!_ Poor Silver’s mind screamed in agony.

“I told you I was coming,” the beautiful witch was saying. “You do check your email still, don’t you, James?”

“To be entirely honest, I’m not sure where my phone even is right now.”

“You need a mother and a maid,” the woman laughed, her hand brushing against what Silver now knew with certainty would be the soft fuzz at the nape of Flint’s skull.

“I have Rackham and Eleanor,” Flint replied with a gentle smile.

Silver’s eyes hurt. Who was this woman? Why was Flint being so nice to her? Letting her touch him like that? Looking at her like that? How dare she call him _James_? What magic had she used to ensnare him? Come to think of it, Silver’s entire brain hurt.

Someone’s hand was insistently pulling at Silver’s elbow. “Didn’t your mother ever teach you it’s impolite to stare?” Even Rackham’s hair seemed somehow bitchy to Silver as he looked up.

“Who is that woman?” he asked, reluctantly following the bassist away from whatever horrors were unfolding before his eyes. Flint and a woman! Flint and _a woman_!!!

“Miranda Hamilton,” Max purred into Silver’s other ear. “A very old, very dear friend of Flint’s.”

“Not _that_ old, darling,” Jack snickered and wiggled his eyebrows.

“Fuck you, Jack,” Anne chimed in.

“She’s also very rich and very beautiful and he is very much at her beck and call,” Max continued. “Not that I’m complaining. The band has needed a mysterious benefactress on more than one occasion, and I, for one, am not above taking Mrs. Hamilton’s money.”

“She’s… married?” Silver attempted, grasping at a ray of hope.

“Widowed, I hear.” Anne made a sign across her throat that made Silver’s own clench. “Rumor has it, she killed her husband so she can be unencumbered to pursue a torrid love affair with Flint.”

“But… but…” Silver was losing his mind. “Flint’s _gay_ , you guys!”

Finally Jack seemed to take pity on Silver's desperation. "Look. She's not the one riding around in the bus now, is she? If you had anything to worry about, you wouldn't be here to begin with."

Silver tried to tell himself that Jack's words made logical sense. But logic and emotion were rare bedfellows, and though he tried to tell himself to just take an early night, when he returned to the hotel room he found himself restless and irritable. He finally turned on some shitty house hunting reality TV show to keep himself from physically pacing, digging out the remnants of a bottle of shitty vodka from his bag and wishing there was enough of it to get disgustingly shitfaced.

Was she British? She sounded British. “Fuck England!” Silver spat out from the depth of his own despair. For a moment, he wondered if this was the same pit of despair where Flint’s most terrible verses came from. Should he also put pen to paper? He pushed the idea away as soon as it arose. Nothing but disgusting emo drivel would come of that.

He pulled out his phone and thought about texting Muldoon. He’d be well on his way home right now, to his Adult Job, in his Adult Car. Silver had been lucky he’d agreed to come with him as far as Chicago in the first place. Besides, what could he possibly tell his friend that wouldn’t get him mocked at this point?

The last thing he expected was the knock that came at his door sometime later. Angrily, he rose from the bed where he'd thrown himself, tossing the empty bottle in the trash on his way to fling open the door. "What?!"

He wasn't sure who he'd expected, irritated at his bout of self-indulgent bad humor being interrupted by one of the band or a poorly timed housekeeping call. Instead it was Flint, visibly startled. "Sorry - did I wake you? Didn't think you'd have gone to bed yet."

The Silver that had spent the past hour or so fuming at the television had practiced a hundred snappy, snarky lines. Suddenly they all slipped away, Flint's demeanor disarming him completely. "Uh, no. No, I..." he waved one hand towards the TV as if a pair of baby-boomers trying to buy a beach home explained everything.

Flint's eyebrows knit together as he regarded the TV. "Oh. Well, if you want to finish...."

"No! No, it's just - it was on." Silver lunged for the TV remote to turn off the offending media. As he did, Flint slipped into the room, flicking the lock behind him.

"I'm glad you waited up for me," he said, his voice the same kind of soft Silver had heard him use with The Witch, a softness that effectively pushed away the rest of his anger.

"You didn't have to rush back," Silver tried to retort. "If your friend..."

Flint gave a fond, soundless laugh. Then he was pulling Silver into his arms, into his kisses, warm and intent and pushing every remaining thought from Silver's head. Flint pulled back, regarding Silver with a strange, soft intensity. His fingers brushed the stray curls away from Silver’s eyes and stroked down to his chin.

“What am I going to do with you?” Flint whispered.

Silver opened his mouth. “I could make a few suggestions.” The chuckle spread from Flint’s chest down his arm and vibrated in the palm of his hand that still lay pressed against Silver’s cheek. He turned his head and pressed his lips into the center of Flint’s palm. It tasted of hotel soap. Flint had washed his hands recently. Had he washed his hands because they had been inside _her_? Silver's lower lip trembled before he could stop it.

"Hey..." This strange, soft Flint caught his mouth in another gentle kiss before he could speak, fingers sliding into Silver's hair to hold him to it. "I can go if you want. But I'd like to stay here with you."

"In _my_ room?" The thought, seemingly inconceivable, escaped Silver's lips.

"Well we're here, aren't we?" He urged Silver back towards the bed.

Was he here because _she_ was in his room? Suddenly Silver didn't want to know. He wrapped his arms up around Flint's neck, trembling, pulling him down onto the bed on top of him. Flint was _here_ , Flint had come to him. That was all he should be thinking about.

Flint gave a pleased noise against his mouth, body solid and strong over him. "I'm really glad you waited up," he murmured again, fingers sliding up inside Silver's shirt.

Silver closed his eyes, tried to tell himself to let it go. Flint was here, and it wasn't Silver's place to make demands. But as Flint's fingers trailed over his ribcage he couldn't help but wonder, picture Flint lifting the woman's shirt, kissing her full breasts reverently, taking her to his bed....

"Who is she?" The words were tiny as they slipped from his mouth, but it was enough to freeze Flint in place. His lips tightened against Silver's, and when he finally spoke his voice was gruff.

"No one you need to worry about."

Why? Because he'd never be in the same league as her? "I need to know."

"I don't want to talk about it."

"But...."

With a groan, Flint rolled off of him, glaring up at the ceiling. “Please… John?” Flint’s head rolled over and his eyes smoldered in the darkness of the room. “Can we please just… Can we please just be _this_ right now?” Uncertainly, Flint’s hand pressed against Silver’s bare chest and his heart gave a powerful beat of rebellion against that soft touch.

“This?” Silver bit his lip. “I very much get that I am nothing but _this_ to you.” He moved Flint’s hand off his chest. “Unlike _her_. Whoever the fuck she is to you.”

Flint groaned and rolled away. “Fuck! You insufferable boy!”

“Yes, I’m sorry I can’t just lie here and pretend like I have no…”

“What? Feelings?” Flint sat up. “Have I ever asked you to pretend anything at all? Have I ever asked anything of you that you weren’t willing to give?”

“No, but…”

“Then why do you make these demands of me?”

“That’s not fair,” Silver bit his lip again to prevent it from quivering.

“And to think, I just spent hours speaking with Miranda about you, when we could have been speaking of a million other things. I told her that when I was with you, I finally felt something like being at peace again…” Flint began to laugh, an ugly laughter that appeared to cut his face in half.

Silver felt his heart crack at the sight of it. He pressed close desperately, catching Flint's face in his hands. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I said anything, please - please forget it. I didn't mean - "

He half expected Flint to pull away in anger, but instead he kissed him, giving a noise against his lips halfway between desperation and desolation. "You devil," he breathed, fingers tightening in his hair. "Beglamouring me so. When I say you have nothing to worry about from her, I mean it. Will you give me that much trust?"

“I’m sorry,” Silver whispered again, feeling as if his eyes were about to fill with unmanly moisture. “I was jealous and I know I have no right to feel that way.” His lips chased Flint’s in a desperate attempt to keep him close. “It’s just… she called you James… And I… All I’ve ever called you is…”

“What?” Flint smiled, his warm hands smoothing down Silver’s neck as if stroking a horse that was about to bolt.

“Sir.” Silver wrinkled his nose in consternation. “Don’t laugh at me,” he pouted when it looked as if Flint was about to do just that.

Flint’s fingers tightened in Silver’s hair and he buried his face in the crook of Silver’s neck, hot air coming in telltale puffs that informed Silver his wishes were not being honored.

“But it feels so good to laugh,” Flint muttered, his words caressing Silver’s earlobe. “You have no idea how good it feels. You make me feel so good, John. You adorable, precious minx.”

“I _want_ to make you feel good,” Silver confessed, beginning to relax a bit into the weight of Flint’s body. With the looming question of _Miranda_ now, if not completely solved, at least no longer worrying, his libido was quickly reminding him of the lovely things Flint had been trying to do to him a few minutes prior. He tilted his head back as Flint's teeth started to worry a path down his neck, the sensation a shiver that ran right to his cock. "It's all I've ever wanted," he breathed, closing his eyes in pleasure at Flint's low, approving hum.

Again Flint's fingers pressed under the hem of his shirt, warm and sure, smoothing up over his ribs. "Then who am I to argue with such a thing, if it gives _you_ pleasure?" His teeth pressed into the roll of muscle at the crook of Silver’s neck, biting down briefly with a low groan. Like a brand, Silver thought with a rush of pleasure, imagining the imprints of Flint's teeth tattooing his skin in bruises for the world to see.

"Harder," he gasped, moving to straddle Flint's lap. "Please...."

"Adorable and incorrigible," Flint growled, pulling away from his neck long enough to pull Silver's shirt up over his head, sending his curls tumbling down wildly over Silver's bare shoulders. Then his mouth was at his neck again, clamping down in a brief lick of pain, then lessening, sucking at the abused skin and lathing with his tongue. The intensity of Flint's mouth was enough to drive every thought from his head, leaving Silver panting for breath, writhing and grinding his cock into Flint's stomach as Flint's teeth worried his skin again and again.

"Mine," Flint growled against his skin finally, giving up his claim on Silver's neck only to claim his mouth, sucking and biting at his lips. His fingers dug into Silver's ass through his jeans, pulling him closer, until Silver felt he might go off untouched, just grinding his cock into the heat of Flint's body.

"Let me ride you," he panted, trying to think whether or not he had lube - god, did he even have condoms? Thankfully Flint appeared to have brought both, shoving a hand into his pocket to retrieve them. Silver pushed Flint down onto his back across the bed, climbing off his lap just long enough to kick off his own jeans and underwear, then pulling Flint’s jeans off and tossing them to the floor. Flint’s cock sprang forth, flushed and proud. Silver felt pretty self-satisfied that he had managed to work Flint into such as state, notwithstanding all the arguing, or - who knew? - perhaps even because of it!

“See this?” Flint’s own eyes traveled to his engorged cock and his hand soon followed, stroking his own length up and down as his eyes locked with Silver’s. “This is all for you.”

“Jesus… _fuck_ ,” Silver shook his head to focus in the sea of the overwhelming lust. “I wish you had two of them, so I wouldn’t feel like I’m constantly making impossible choices.”

“God, I love the shit that comes out of your mouth sometimes,” Flint growled, his own fist pumping faster over his cock as his other hand reached for the condom. “What’ll it be, boy? Are you riding or drooling?”

"Saddle up," Silver responded, grinning as he tore the condom open with his teeth.

Once he was astride Flint and sinking down onto that glorious cock, Silver couldn't imagine how there'd ever been a question. He closed his eyes with a groan, grinding down onto him, the pleasure of being stretched open and filled shuddering through him, hot and intoxicating. His fingers dug into Flint's shoulders, needing to feel like he was anchored somehow in the midst of all that sensation. "Oh god, yes...."

“Fuck… how are you still so tight?” Flint squeezed out, bucking up into Silver, hands clutching feverishly at his hips.

“Youthful…. exuberance…” Silver panted out, working his lower back muscles to grind down in an increasing rhythm against Flint’s lap, till he could feel Flint’s hipbones slamming against the backs of his thighs. “Keep up, old man!”

"Devil," Flint hissed again, though there was a fondness in his eyes that betrayed his words. The next thing Silver knew he was being pulled into Flint's arms, into a kiss that was all heat and teeth and tongue, as if set on stealing Silver's very breath just as he controlled his pleasure. One hand dug into the small of Silver's back, pulling him in as his hips thrust up to meet the bucks of Silver's hips.

"Harder," he gasped again, and underneath him, Flint growled.

"Harder?" The next thing Silver knew he was pressed back into the pillows with his calves against Flint's shoulders, bent nearly in two as Flint bucked into him hard and fast. "I'll give you harder, you little incubus," he growled, panting, eyes dark and wild as he looked down at him. "Give you everything you want... show you just who your hot little ass belongs to - !"

The thought was too much for Silver to handle. In moments he was crying out, pleasure overwhelming him completely as he arched up into the punishing pounding of Flint's cock. He heard Flint curse as Silver clenched down around him, hips stuttering deeper, and the pleasure of Silver's orgasm pulsed bright with the satisfaction of knowing that James Flint had come inside him, hard and deep.

 _I love you_ , he wanted to say, and only managed to keep his words back because he had no breath to say them. Instead he pulled Flint down on top of him, pressing breathless, trembling kisses to his lips and face, heart aching with unspoken joy. He felt far drunker on it than he ever could have gotten from the cheap vodka, and happily let Flint manhandle him into bed and curl around him, turning out the bedside lamp.

Just as he was drifting off to sleep, Flint mumbled something against his neck. Silver blinked to alertness. "Sorry?"

"She's Porthos," Flint repeated, words muffled in his shoulder.

"She's your..." Silver started, then quickly stopped as it all came clear. "... oh. Then... uh, Aramis...."

Flint let out a long breath, and for a moment Silver thought he wasn't going to respond. When he finally did, his voice was weary. "It turned out, Aramis couldn’t live with what had occurred and so one night he wrote Athos's father a check for the full amount. We assume he intended to give it to him as a grand romantic gesture. To try and make things right with... Athos."

"You... assume?" Silver asked tentatively, mind moving wildly over the possibilities. Was there still a poodle out there who loved Flint as much as he did?

"The bloody prat got wasted and went for a swim in the ocean. Left nothing behind for Miranda but a ridiculous fucking life insurance policy. So we've had to come to terms with that question remaining unanswered."

From the tone of Flint's voice, it sounded like he'd done anything but. Still, Silver couldn't help but feel the deepest sorrow for him, for everything he'd been through. Even for Miranda.

"Fuck England," he said softly, and Flint pressed a trembling kiss to his lips.

"Yes. Fuck England."

~~~


	8. The Chart Topper

When Flint headed out on his walk of shame from Silver’s room, he’d left the other man awake and writing. Silver had waved him off, refusing offers to have anything brought back from breakfast. Their vociferous fucking of the prior night must have been very inspirational, Flint concluded as he headed first over to his own room to make himself look slightly presentable, and then to the dining area to meet Miranda before her flight to New York.

“So, you’re heading to O’Hare?”

She nodded. “And you to Madison?”

“Wisconsin beckons,” Flint confirmed, dipping his breakfast sausage into his maple syrup much to Miranda’s shock.

“Aren’t you going to tell me how it went with your poet friend last night?” She smirked daintily over her waffle. That had always been the terrifying thing about Miranda Hamilton, she could read him like an open book. “I assumed that was where you ended up after we said goodnight. Was I wrong?”

“It was fine. Listen,” Flint made a dismissing gesture with his fork, “that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about last night. Sorry we got so off track.”

“If you say so.”

“It’s about the Urca Prize.”

“I heard you and VANE are neck in neck,” Miranda’s smile told him all he needed to know about her thoughts on the subject. “Really, James, I do wish you hadn’t given up your career in classical music.”

“I make more money this way, believe it or not.”

“I know this isn’t about the money for you.”

“It isn’t.” His hand rested on top of hers. “It’s about revenge.”

“How is winning the Urca going to stick it to your father?” she asked, her voice tinged with exasperation.

“The biggest musical award show in the northern hemisphere, Miranda. If we take the Urca, the world’s eyes will be upon us. I will never have a bigger, broader audience than for that acceptable speech.”

Miranda’s eyes widened and her fingers clenched around Flint’s hand. “You’re not really thinking of…”

“Telling the whole story? Yes, I am. Exactly that. With your permission, of course.”

Miranda was silent for a few moments, but did not let go of his hand. “It won’t bring Thomas back,” she finally said. “And it will likely destroy your father’s career.”

“That’s the whole point, Miranda! He destroyed our _lives_! Destroying his career is the least I can do to repay him for his generosity.”

“It wasn’t all his fault,” Miranda lowered her voice to a whisper. “Thomas and I were just as complicit in it. We all made choices and have paid for them. You were the only one of us who was innocent, untouched by those choices, and I’m so sorry that you hurt so much!”

“Miranda…”

“But this path you are on, it does not lead to absolution, or forgiveness! You told me yesterday that when you’re with your American boy, you can finally find peace? Why don’t you chose _that_ instead of the path of vengeance?”

“I cannot walk away. Not after everything he’s done. Not after everything _I’ve_ done.”

“You have punished yourself for the transgressions of others,” Miranda said, shaking her head. “If this is what you feel you must do, then of course I will stand by you, as I have in the years since we lost Thomas. But if you do it, just go into it with your eyes open. Please. Promise me you’ll think about what I’ve said?”

He picked up her hand off the table and pressed it to his lips. “I promise.”

“I’m so happy I got to see you again, James. Please, take care of yourself.”

“I will,” he promised her.

His mind was made up, no turning back now. The only thing that remained is to make sure Silver wrote a fucking fantastic song and then the Urca would be as good as theirs. But he could still promise her to think about what she’d said. It was the least she deserved after all the crap she had put up with from him, after all.

~~~

The bus ride to Madison was familiar to Flint, and yet strange. Familiar in the picture of Anne Bonny on the couch with her guitar plugged into a small amp, one foot tucked under her, and Max at her side, cross-legged with a beat up little 49 key midi controller balanced across her knees. It was their normal mode of on-the-road composition, and he'd heard the birth and death of dozens of tunes. Rarely, when something passed both of their exacting standards, they'd drag Jack in for a bassline, and Billy would drum out a rhythm on the galley table, much to the annoyance of the poodles.

Strange, in that dragging Jack in for a bassline now included _Silver_ , perched on top of Anne's amp in the middle of the aisle, bent over her scrawled score and nodding along as he chewed on his pencil. Every so often Anne would stop, and they'd converse, heads together with Max's over the score and Silver's notebook, making adjustments. Then they'd start over again, with Silver humming faintly under his breath, fingers tapping a rhythm on his thigh over the chords of the guitar.

Normally Flint did his best to stay out of it, not caring to get invested in anything until they brought him a scratch track to put lyrics to. But "normally" didn't involve his hopes and dreams for the Urca. Or one John Silver.

Part of him wanted to hover, to sit himself on the back of the couch or lean over the galley booth to see exactly every move they made. But that would have certainly been overbearing, so he finally set himself in the front corner of the other couch with the poodles, doing his best to hold the squirming things still as he gave them a good brush and tried to act like he wasn't paying attention at all.

"Don't suppose I'll get to see lyrics soon?" he asked Silver during a pause, trying to sound like it didn't matter at all despite being irritatingly curious.

The adorable thing actually blushed. "Soon," he promised. "I just... I just want to make sure everything's perfect. But soon."

"Whenever," Flint replied through gritted teeth, and picked up the grooming comb again as they went back to it.

"Do we need a third verse after the middle eight? I think I can write another - "

"Nah, we're going for chart-topper, not stairway to heaven."

"Maybe another few bars here after the modulation for a strings breakdown?"

Flint raised his head at Max's words. "I'm sorry, what?"

The girls and Silver looked at him in unison, looking much like the poodles after getting into something they shouldn't have. Max smiled immediately. "Nothing to worry about, mon cher. It will all be through the magic of synthesizers."

The word made the hair on the back of Flint's neck rise, but he refused to take the bait. "Good, because I'm not recording any fucking string solos or breakdowns."

"Mmhmm!" Max's smile was as obvious as Anne's eyeroll. Silver opened his mouth as if to say something, then prudently closed it again.

It was none of his business, Flint tried to tell himself, glaring down at the poodles. They could do what they fucking wanted, and he'd sing it, and they'd have a hit. That was all that mattered. But the next thing he knew they were plugging in to record a scratch track, and he realized that the terrible tinny wailing that had been coming from Max's keyboard was actually _part of it_ , and his temper bubbled over.

"What the actual fuck do you all think you're doing?"

From the other end of his couch, Eleanor raised her head from the book she'd been reading, fingers stopping their idle caress of Porthos' newly groomed fur. "Writing a hit, I believe."

"With that fucking - that fucking wailing garbage?"

Max looked at him calmly - god, was that a smirk on her lips? "This so-called wailing garbage is an industry accepted string quartet effect."

"An industry of what, tone-deaf douchebags?"

"You think you can do better?" Max's smile was undeniably smug now, Flint noted, but he was too far gone into outrage to stop now.

"I sure as fucking hell can do better!"

"Good. Then we'll give a scratch track and you can figure it out," Anne declared, smirking. "If you have something good by the time we get to Portland we'll let you record it for the release."

 _Let_ him? "Don't act like you're the one doing me a fucking favor," he growled.

"I think we can all agree that the song will be best if everyone contributes to, ah, the best of his or her ability," Jack interjected weakly. "Yes?"

"Fuck you, Jack," Flint spat back on reflex, unintentionally echoing Anne.

Well, at least _that_ was something they could agree on.

~~~

 

By the time they'd played Minneapolis, Silver had listened to the scratch track what seemed like a dozen times, mentally matching his words with the line of the melody that played through his tinny iphone earbuds. By the time the show in Denver was over, Silver could sing it in his sleep. But still he held the finished lyrics close to his heart, apart from the partial draft he'd shown Anne. Were they good enough for Flint? Why was he so nervous to show him? The worst that could happen was that Flint would want to change things, and Silver could take constructive criticism. Surely Flint would like them at least a little bit, wouldn't he?

He was over-thinking, he knew, changing words in his head back and forth, swapping them around until he could hardly remember which version it was he'd liked to begin with. The only time he felt really confident was when he was in Flint's arms, exhausted and too well-fucked to worry. He only wished he could carry that clarity with him all the time.

He woke early one morning and crept from Flint's arms to curl up in the hotel room's office chair, plugging in his headset and closing his eyes. _It'll be good. It'll be a hit. It'll be everything he needs._

Halfway through the second repeat, he was startled from his reverie by the warm press of Flint's lips, his fingers tugging the earbuds from his ears. "Working already?" he murmured. "Come back to bed."

Silver whined softly. "I want to. I really, really do. I'm just worried about the song...."

"I'm sure it'll be fine," Flint replied, though his words would have been more reassuring if he hadn't been kissing a path down Silver's neck. "Come on."

"I'm serious!"

"So am I." Flint kissed away his complaint, pushing the chair across the carpet. "Besides, doesn't sex inspire you?"

"Well of course it does, but - "

"Well then, get in bed and I'll do my duty. For the good of the song, of course."

Flint's eyes were bright with good humor, and more than anything Silver wanted to give in, to lose himself in the bliss of Flint's body before they had to hit the road again. "Please," he said softly, catching Flint's hands in his. "I need it to be good. I need it to be good _enough_."

Flint opened his mouth as if to protest, and then stopped, expression softening. "All right, then. Plug it in."

"What?"

Flint rounded the bed to his pile of gear, extracting a violin case. "Your phone. Throw it up to the alarm clock. If you need to work at this ungodly hour of the morning I'll just have to work with you."

As Flint tightened his bowstrings, Silver fought with the urge to protest. He was painfully aware that at this point it was just stupid not to let Flint see what he'd written. But as the chords of Anne's guitar started to play through the tinny alarm clock speaker, Flint practically paid him no heed, standing in the middle of the room with the violin tucked under his chin, eyes closed in concentration.

He'd clearly listened to the scratch track a number of times himself, Silver thought, leaning back in the chair and watching. Flint was still through the first verse, and as the tempo of the song picked up into the chorus he brought the bow across the strings, adding a singing, shining note to the composition, then another, accenting the line of the melody. Then he began to play in earnest, the violin becoming its own entity, crying sad and sweet through the instrumental before fading again to let the second verse take the stage.

A chill ran down Silver's spine. _How have you never done this before?_ he wanted to cry. With the addition of Flint's violin, the track became so much more than a simple rock ballad. The song became a story, an anthem to love, Flint somehow sensing the emotion that Silver was trying to build and infusing it into the instrumentals. Did they even need his lyrics, with such beauty?

Flint had never looked more glorious, standing naked in the middle of the room without a care except for the music, his brows knit in concentration as the bow resonated against the strings. The whole experience was so enthralling that before Silver had even thought about lyrics he'd reached the final chorus, a beautiful, triumphant climax of sound greater than anything he could have imagined, and when Flint lowered the bow he could only stare at him in awe.

Flint's concentration softened as he lowered the violin, gaze turning to Silver. "Did that help?"

"I - ah. A little?"

His answer seemed to satisfy Flint. "I'll go through it again, then," he said, hitting the button to repeat the track.

The kindness in his voice and his smile struck Silver. If someone had asked him a month ago if the great rock god James Flint were capable of this, Silver would have laughed. But it only made the moment more poignant. He couldn't help but treasure the thought that Flint felt like he could be this way around him, lower his guard, the mask of his anger.

Then a thought crossed his mind, that he wasn't just doing it because he felt comfortable - he genuinely was so, and perhaps it was Silver who'd made him that way. All this _softness_ was for Silver's benefit, even now Flint was playing for him, trying to help him be more confident in his work.

He was humming along with the intro before he could even think to second guess himself again, and then the words were coming from his lips, soft and true and finally _right_.

 _Come, my love, it’s time to explode._  
_I am the match and you’re the firework,_  
_We can start a revolution,_  
_Scream until the Earth awoke_  
_I am the match and you’re the firework._

Flint's golden eyelashes fluttered open as Silver started to sing. He glanced over, lips turning up in a smile, then closed his eyes again. Silver felt a flood of warmth at the silent approval, and felt his voice grow stronger. He certainly wasn't a singer, but his pitch was true, and with Flint's violin singing before him he could suddenly feel every word with perfect poignancy, with all the emotion he'd wanted them to have.

 _Your touch might burn_  
_But I’m already ash_  
_Watch as I rise like the phoenix_  
_Out of their hatred_  
_And out of their lies_  
_Just like the phoenix I rise._

 _Come, my love, we’re going to war,_  
_I am the match and you’re the firework,_  
_There’s no time for absolution,_  
_No more time for shallow words._  
_I am the match and you’re the firework._

It wasn't a declaration of anger, railing at everyone and everything that had done Flint wrong. He'd never really wanted that, Silver realized. Because there was so much more to Flint than that. There could be so much...

 _Hold me, my love, seal our fate with a kiss,_  
_We can be fireworks together,_  
_No one will hurt you with me by your side,_  
_No one could dare love you better._

 _So touch me again_  
_For we're already ash_  
_Watch as we rise like the phoenix._  
_Out of their hatred_  
_And out of their lies_  
_Just like the phoenix we rise._

As the energy of the climax faded into silence, Silver's confidence suddenly went with it. What if Flint hated it? What if he'd been too transparent? What if Flint resented that he was the inspiration, what if -

Silently, Flint set his violin and bow back in the case, closing the clasp with a snap. Then he moved to where Silver still sat in the office chair, tilting it back as he leaned down to claim Silver's mouth in a slow, deep kiss.

"I'm going to need you to come back to bed with me now," he murmured when Silver could breathe again.

Silver swallowed hard. "Does that mean... you liked it?"

Flint answered with another kiss. "Very much."

"And... you think you can... sing it?"

This time Flint smiled as he kissed him, pulling him out of the chair and into his arms. "Yeah. Yeah, I think I can."

~~~


	9. Ignite

_“Ignite” proves to be that rare hit that combines a sense of youthful rebelliousness with defiant romance in both lyrics and orchestration, giving Ambien Walrus something that most of their songs have historically been lacking: a genuine emotional core. Audiences as well as critics have connected with the new anthem, which should give the traditionally queercore punk rock band a shot at winning a prize that they themselves would have scoffed at as being “too mainstream” in the past. Ambien Walrus took a gamble with a rock ballad, and it looks to be about to pay off._

Eleanor set the review aside and winked. “I’m so proud of you, lot. I always suspected you could do great things with just a little bit of inspiration.”

“Are we really considered queercore?” Arms asked from his bunk, chewing on a piece of turkey jerky with a pensive expression on his face.

“Have you met us?” Jack responded, causing a new outburst of general glee.

Pressed against the wall of the bus in Flint’s narrow bunk, Silver burrowed his nose into his lover's armpit and whispered, “You’re going to win the Urca.”

“Let’s not count our chickens quite yet, pet,” Flint muttered into Silver’s hair, his fingers absentmindedly stroking through the long curls.

“James, I hope you’re fucking that boy _good_ because I’m going to need him to stay and write every song on our next album!” Eleanor shouted over the din and Silver burrowed deeper into Flint’s armpit in a futile attempt to hide his growing embarrassment.

“I’m doing my best, Ma’am!” Flint saluted from the bunk.

“Oh my god…” Silver pulled the blanket up over his head.

“Don’t encourage them, El. Those two are bloody gross,” Anne’s raspy voice carried across the galley.

“Gross sells!”

“Buck up, young Shakespeare,” Flint purred into Silver’s ear, brushing the blanket and his curls aside. “We’ll be in Los Angeles soon.”

~~~

The Urca de Lima awards ceremony was rather more grand than Flint would have preferred. It put him in mind of too many political events and fundraisers from his childhood - all tuxedos and designer gowns and crystal flutes of champagne. As they were performing, along with all the other Urca-finalists, Flint had tried his best to convince Eleanor that normal stage wear was the best bet. The compromise had been a matched set of punk-rock flavoured formal-wear - Anne and Max in deconstructed ballgowns of black leather and frayed red plaid, Jack in red-plaid skinny trou under his black silk jacket, and Arms' tux jacket - barely fitting over his bulging biceps - trimmed with red plaid piping, chains and rivets.

Flint, well, he was happy to stick to the classics, butter soft leather pants snug to his skin, and nothing underneath the matching jacket but several thick, heavy silver chains. If felt like something that was still part of _his_ world, a carefully forged suit of armor against the sea of stuck-up pricks and conformity.

Silver, meanwhile....

Flint followed the young man with his eyes as he moved through the crowd easily, with the same bright exuberance he brought to everything else. He cleaned up beautifully into the tux Eleanor had rented for him, dark curls pulled back into a ponytail. Like a silvery fish, swimming effortlessly through a sea of sheep without actually being one of them. He somehow managed to respond to idle chatter far more eloquently than Flint himself ever could, leaving Flint feeling strangely proud, and for the first time wondering exactly why Silver had taken up with them when he clearly could have had the whole world, if he wanted it.

A glass of scotch in hand, Jack let his arm rest on Flint's shoulder, lounging with brazen familiarity. Flint decided to allow it, for the moment. "And now we see," Jack remarked, "why early man abandoned the hunter-gatherer ways of the neanderthal to begin a life of agriculture."

Flint turned his gaze sideways to the man. "Jack. What the _actual_ fuck?"

"That!" Jack made an idle motion to where Silver was fetching champagne from a stack of goblets. "Why the hell would you put all the work and effort into going out to eat when you could have that in your backyard?" He stepped back, patting Flint on the back. "Congratulations on reaching the next level of civilization. Just, you know. Make sure he stays watered and all that. If you catch my drift."

For a long moment Flint regarded the man through narrowed eyes, contemplating whether or not he deserved to have the fingers that were still lingering on Flint's shoulder broken. Unfortunately, they still had to play, and while there were bassists in attendance by the dozens he didn't fancy Anne's guitar to the back of his head. "I'm going to ignore the fact that you just referred to my... Silver as well as half our band as _plants_ and take that as a compliment."

"Good man." Jack nodded. "I'll insist that the next bus we rent has _two_ Fuck Rooms."

The next bus. The thought of having such a permanence in his life as Silver could turn out to be was something that would have sent Flint running six months ago. Now he was finding quite the opposite, and seeing the ease and grace with which Silver moved throughout his world made him suddenly worried that Silver wouldn't, couldn't be content hanging out long term with an angry punk rock band with delusions of grandeur.

Giving him a wide smile as he reached them, Silver pressed a glass of champagne into Flint's hand. "Incredible, isn't it? And everyone loves the song! You _have_ to win. There's no other option."

What faith. Despite his inner turmoil, Flint found himself smiling. He knocked back the glass of champagne in a gulp, then leaned in close. "People will be getting seated soon. We should go take a piss."

"Well I don't really need...." Silver stopped, suddenly understanding. Grinning. "Oh. Yes. Yes, we should."

Getting the knees of both their suits dirty in the men’s room was a pleasant enough distraction that, when they were finally seated in the awards hall, Flint didn't even care about having to sit through forty-five minutes of pompous presenters and even more pompous acceptance speeches, prattling on about the honor of going platinum or getting the Humanitarian Award or other such drivel. They were blessedly interspersed with musical performances, though not nearly enough to make up for the pretentious douchebaggery. To his annoyance, VANE was performing ahead of them, but Ambien Walrus had secured the performance slot right after, before the Urca award for Rock Band of the Year, which he hoped was a portent of fortune. Even better, it meant that they didn't have to _sit_ through Vane stripping on stage, slipping out of the auditorium to get ready as their rival materialized amidst the smoke machines.

In the back hall, Eleanor glared at the stage door, through which they could hear Vane's muffled growling. "I hate that this motherfucker makes me so wet," she muttered under her breath as she passed by Flint, who decided to ignore her disgustingness in favor of tightening his violin bow. It took rather more self control to keep from punching the smug smile off Vane's stupid face as he passed them on the way offstage. They were going to get the better of the greasy prat. He had to believe that.

Then, after one last tedious award, Ambien Walrus was taking the stage. It was strange to Flint, to walk out under the lights to the enthusiastic-but-neat applause instead of the screams of the fans, to listen to Anne start in on “Ignite” with gentle, melodic notes instead of angry power chords, joined by the brightness of Max's keys, then Jack's bassline. It was strange, to start into the first verse with violin in hand instead of clutching the mic stand like a weapon. But it was all worth it, to hear the clear voice of his violin sing out over the crowd in the instrumental break, taking over from the backing track he'd pre-recorded, perfectly punctuating Silver's soulful lyrics.

He could have used the backing track throughout, of course. But there was a certain feeling of rightness to bringing his violin to the stage on a night like tonight. Doing his best to tell Silver's beautiful story to the world. Giving everything he had to the song.

If they didn't win the Urca, at least he could be satisfied with that. And as Flint's bow soared through the instrumental breakdown before the final chorus, he found himself smiling. He wasn't sure when, but somehow music had stopped being just a tool for his revenge. This was his life, now. Him, the crew of Ambien Walrus... and Silver.

When they returned to their seats, Silver was nearly vibrating with happiness, pulling Flint into a brief, tight hug. "You sounded amazing!" he whispered. "If you don't win then they're all fucking tone-deaf hacks and lunatics!"

His faith was enough that Flint didn't even care that Eleanor was blatantly sucking face with the cretin two rows ahead of them.

He turned his attention to the stage, where self-professed rock legend +BLA!!!CKB'eard+ was expounding on the history and prestige of the Urca de Lima Rock Band of the Year award, from its start as a counter-culture fuck you to the pop-music happy Grammys to its present status as the pinnacle of rock music awards.

"Shut the fuck up already, Dadbeard," Anne grumbled beside him, smirking as Max giggled into her sleeve.

"And now, in no particular order, the nominations for Rock Band of the Year are: The Royal Lion. Ambien Walrus. HORNEYGOLD & DOUCHEFRESNE. The Fancy. And finally, an incredibly talented and attractive young man with whom I have had the great fortune of touring: my son, VANE."

So much for getting an impartial presenter, Flint thought.

"And now, without any additional gesticulating or further ado, the esteemed and admirable winner of this year's Urca de Lima Rock Band of the Year award is...." +BLA!!!CKB'eard+ tore open the envelope in his hand and went silent, brows knitting as he stared down at the piece of paper. Then he leaned towards the man holding the awards at his side, whispering something in his ear.

The man nodded.

+BLA!!!CKB'eard+ frowned, then shrugged, stepping back to the microphone. "Ambien Walrus."

Elation rushed through every nerve in Flint's body. He was on his feet in an instant, kissing Silver, kissing... Anne? While Arms loudly proclaimed, "FUCK YEAH!"

"I knew it! I knew you'd do it!" Silver gasped, hugging him tight. He pressed a kiss to Flint's ear, the whisper of his voice warm and proud and real. "I love you so much, James Flint."

 _Shit,_ Flint thought as he let Anne drag him away from Silver and up towards the stage. _I love him too._

A whirl of handshakes later, Flint stood again at the mic in front of hundreds of the most important names in industry, this time with the shining gold replica of the Spanish galleon of his victory clutched in his free hand. He knew what was supposed to come next. He'd practiced it dozens of times in front of the mirror of his hotel room, how he was going to curse and rail at his homophobic father and his precious institution and country for the whole world to see. But somehow all those carefully practiced words had been completely pushed from his mind, erased in favor of a whisper.

_I love you so much, James Flint._

"Goddammit," he muttered under his breath. Then he gave the world a smile. "Thank you to the fans and honored colleagues who voted for us,” he began, in measured tones. “Of course, we owe a huge debt of gratitude to the backbone of our band, our esteemed manager Eleanor Guthrie, without whom none of this would be possible. Even though she's currently sucking face with Charles Vane over there in the third row. And a huge congratulations to Vane for scoring that prize, which even he must admit is more priceless than the Urca.”

“Hear hear!” Vane shouted from the audience, causing various faction to break out in impromptu applause.

"Finally, I must admit that I initially had far different plans for this acceptance speech. Very angry, hurtful plans, more suited to the chaos of a punk show than such a prestigious occasion, plans having to do with my father, the leader of Her Majesty's Most Loyal Opposition in the British Parliament. Instead, my greatest thanks must be to the man who made this collective dream come true. A man who has proven to be the most talented collaborator I could have ever hoped for, a man who has changed my life in ways I never thought possible. And so I must dedicate this award to the love of my life, John Silver, without whom there would be no music."

“Was _that_ queercore?” Flint heard Arms whisper to someone behind him.

Flint didn't even care to curse him out. Shoving the mic at Jack, he jumped off the stage entirely amongst thunderous applause, leaping to where Silver stood waiting, eyes bright with tears, hands over his mouth. Flint swept him up into his arms, tugging Silver's hands from his mouth so he could kiss it, for once not caring who saw and what they thought of it. "I love you too, John Silver."

~~~

On the way to the after-party, cuddled against Flint's side in the limo, Silver pulled out his cellphone to find multiple messages from Muldoon.

_OMG U GUYS WON!!!_

_OMG UR THE MAN. I JUST BOUGHT SO MANY DRINKS_

_omg OMG DID U JUST GET MARRIED ON NATIONAL TV?!?_

Chuckling to himself, Silver sent back a smiling face, a winking face, and a plethora of hearts. He couldn't imagine being any happier even if Flint _had_ straight up proposed. The night wasn't supposed to be about him at all, but somehow Flint had made him part of it. Part of the greatest triumph for the greatest band in the world, and then, beyond Silver's wildest dreams, Flint had made Silver part of his heart, too.

He glanced at Flint's phone, smiling up at his lover as Flint tucked it away into the breast pocket of his leather suit jacket. "Is Miranda happy?"

"Very," Flint replied, pressing a kiss to his temple. "Almost as happy as I am."

When they reached the dock where the after-party-cruise was boarding from, Idelle was waiting in a little black dress, leashes for all three poodles in hand. Silver laughed, catching hold of Athos as he jumped up on him in excitement.

“Hey there, buddy, did you miss me?” he asked the poodle, while scratching behind his ears.

“I understand Flint doesn’t have any fucking hair, but would it have killed the rest of you to thank _me_?” Idelle was chiding Jack while exchanging hugs and kisses with the rest of the band. Then, spotting the canoodling forms of Eleanor and Vane getting out of the next limo, “The fuck is _he_ doing here?”

“Love, it appears, is blind,” Flint informed the young woman, scooping Porthos from her hands. “And also immune to malodorous fumes.”

“You old romantic,” Silver punched Flint playfully in the shoulder. Then he felt a sudden spike of worry. "Wait... I don't smell, right?"

"Only wonderfully," Flint replied, kissing his hair again. "Come on, let's get celebratory drunk."

Of course - the surprise. Worry immediately changed to anticipatory excitement for Silver. He'd wanted to get Flint something to celebrate the win, but what on earth could he possibly find that would be worthy of celebrating an award like the Urca? The answer had come to him at 2am one night on the tour bus as he'd been brainstorming ideas for future song lyrics.

With any luck, Flint would find it as endearing as Silver hoped.

“God fucking damn it!” a gravelly voice, immediately recognizable as Charles Vane’s, exclaimed from behind them. “One of your poodles just pissed on my fucking pants!”

“Must’ve been Aramis,” Silver shrugged, as if that was the most natural thing in the world. “He doesn’t like strangers.”

“Welcome to the family, Charles,” Flint smirked and bent down to pet the little black poodle on his head. “Good boy, Aramis. Daddy loves you.”

“Please don’t ever have children,” Jack said, giving Flint a friendly pat on the back and winking at Silver.

"The poodles are already the perfect children," Silver told him, feeling a rush of pleasure at Flint's smile, then following him up the gangplank, Athos's leash in hand.

Silver was entirely wrapped up in Flint, happily hanging off his arm as they mingled, eating tiny fancy hors d'oeuvres and drinking whatever people placed in his hand, handing the poodles off to whatever admirers welcomed the humping. 

He was so caught up in Flint that he hardly noticed when they set sail, and felt a spike of alarm when he looked out the window to realize that they were already halfway out of the harbour. "Shit, shit!"

"Shit?" Flint raised an eyebrow.

"I have a - a thing! Hold on." Quickly gathering the poodle leashes, he towed them over to where Eleanor was seated on a couch with Vane, practically in his lap. "Hold these!"

"I'm not a poodle sitter."

"Just for a moment, I promise. There's a thing and they probably won't like it so - just take them!" He shoved the leashes at her, barely making sure she'd taken them before rushing away, catching Flint's arm and towing him out towards the back deck of the boat.

"I'm not sure I want to leave my poodles with Vane...."

"Only a moment," Silver assured him again. "It'll be worth it. I hope. I mean, they'll be fine."

Fortunately Idelle was already on deck with the large confetti cannon. She peered at Silver. "Are you in a fit state to be handling firearms?"

"I've only had a couple!" Silver insisted. "Beside, you just point and push the button, right?" He adjusted the angle towards the back rail of the ship, then turned to give Flint a nervous smile. "So. I thought we should celebrate the whole Urca thing, and considering, well, everything, there's really only one thing fitting. And the band agreed to help me...."

"If you hate it, it was all his idea," Max added sweetly.

"He won't hate it!" Silver shot back. "Anyway. I'm going to do the thing now. Guys, on three?" Silver took a deep breath, a hand over the trigger for the cannon. "One, two, three!"

"FUCK ENGLAND!" Chorused the band, as the confetti cannon shot the contents of a family pack of Earl Grey tea bags into the air to tumble down into the waves, the tea labels fluttering in the breeze as they fell.

For a moment Flint stood frozen, watching the tea bags fall over the water. Then he turned to Silver. "Did you just... throw tea into the harbor for me?"

"Erm..." Silver scuffed his toe against the deck. "Yes?"

For one brief, horrible moment, Silver thought Flint was going to be angry. Then he broke into peals of laughter, catching Silver up in his arms and swinging him around, laughing and laughing and setting him down to kiss him through his laughter. 

"You blessed, ridiculous boy!" Flint gasped when he could finally speak, wiping tears of laughter from his eyes, "I'm going to marry the fuck out of you."

~~~


	10. 2 Men, 3 Cocks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, here it is: the last chapter! We're so embarrassed for them (and for us). Here is a nice picture of the Ambien Walrus to lull you all to sweet dreams:
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> (That explains what happened to Flint's hair!)

 

~~~

 

“I cannot believe you went wine tasting for your bachelor’s party,” Silver tittered, head resting against the warm softness of Flint’s naked stomach. “How old are you again?”

“Old enough to know better,” Flint’s voice purred next to him, fingers massaging into Silver’s curls as he closed his eyes in contentment.

“Meaning?”

“Well, it wasn’t going to be rent boys and blow for me the night before I marry my one true wet dream,” Flint chuckled and Silver reached his hand out blindly towards his lips, suddenly needing to touch them for speaking those words. Flint kissed his fingers tenderly. “There’s a word for that, you know.”

“Stupid twat?”

“Tempting fate,” Flint replied, biting around one of Silver’s knuckles playfully. “Plus I had to stop by the court to drop off my paperwork.”

“To change your name?” Silver pulled himself up the bed, so he could lie nose to nose with Flint. “I would have married you even if your name was legally McGraw.”

“I know,” Flint leaned forward for a kiss and Silver let their lips linger warmly over each other for a few seconds.

“You’re right though. John Silver-McGraw doesn’t have the same ring as John Silver-Flint.”

Flint grinned broadly. “If you’re taking my name, why not just John Flint?”

“John Silver-Flint sounds better. I also considered Flint-Silver, but decided against it.”

“And why exactly do _you_ get to decide?”

“Because, my darling, I am the wordsmith in this family. Everyone knows that!”

From where they were rolling about on the floor, one of the poodles yipped in approval. At least, Silver decided to take it as approval.

“And you, pet? How was your bachelor’s?”

“Gooooood,” Silver drawled, throwing a leg over Flint’s hip. “Vane came by.”

“The fuck does that wanker want with you?” Flint bristled.

“To hire me, apparently.” Silver grinned. “You should have heard him. He said he needed me to write him a song that would make Eleanor forget all other men and women.”

Flint laughed. “Good luck with that.”

“You would’ve loved it,” Silver went on, running his fingers over the short bristles covering Flint’s scalp. “Vane says, ‘What rhymes with Eleanor? All I keep coming back to is sore and snore.’ So, logically, I suggested ‘adore’ and he shouted, ‘See? That’s why I need you!’”

“Don’t write a screenplay based on it or anything,” Flint snorted.

“Truly, darling, that man is in desperate straits.”

“The straights are always desperate.”

“That’s not..!” Silver surrendered to the onslaught of a chuckling Flint’s tongue.

~~~

The end of the following day found Silver no less helpless to Flint's tongue, which seemed determined to drive him out of what remained of his mind. Silver laughed as Flint tongued the soft skin behind his ear, while trying to keep upright and find the hotel suite door key in his tux pocket. He'd told himself that he was going to stick to only two glasses of champagne, but somehow his glass had kept getting refilled, and the world had quickly turned into fizzy bubbles.

"I have to get the key so we can go inside and fuck," Silver whined, finding the key and staring resolutely at the lock slot as if it would make it easier to put the card in. “It was part of our vows, remember?”

How could Flint forget? Eleanor, in the role of officiant, had been quite clear. _“James, do you promise to fuck John into submission so that he never stops writing hits for this band?”_

_“I do. I mean… what? That’s… those are not our vows!”_

“Those were not our actual vows! Regardless of what Eleanor thinks!”

“Are you saying you _don’t_ wanna fuck?” Silver slurred, finally shoving the key into the slot and punching the air as the light turned green.

“I would _never_ not want to fuck you,” Flint protested, hand pressed against his heart, as he tumbled into the room after Silver. "I would have just been perfectly happy to do it in the hallway." He patted his pockets for his pack of cigarettes. “Shit!”

“What’s wrong.”

“I handed my smokes to Miranda when I gave her the rings. Matron of Dishonor, indeed!”

“She never gave them back?”

Flint pouted and headed towards the minibar. “Never trust a woman, Mrs. Me. Their brains are much more conniving than a man’s.”

“Especially that one. She seems like such a chain-smoker,” Silver tittered, pawing at his bow-tie until it somehow came undone and abandoning it to the rug. “Wait, did you just call me… ‘Mrs. Me’? Because I never consented to that title.”

“Oh, come off it.” Flint’s grin was sly and feral. “I got you a wedding gift, darling. Would you like to see it now?”

Somewhere, deep in Silver's intoxicated brain, he knew he was grinning like an idiot. Fuzzy-bubbly Silver didn't care. "A wedding gift besides you and your glorious cock?"

"Aha!" Flint crossed the room back to him in two quick strides, sweeping Silver up into a kiss. "Now, it's funny you should say that."

“I love you, but should I be worried? Also, can you get this... this THING?" He pawed helplessly at the buckle of his cummerbund as he turned around.

"Your ass? Most certainly." Flint's arm snaked around his waist to pull Silver back against his delightfully hard cock, which pressed against the crease of Silver's ass through their slacks.

Silver closed his eyes at the sensation, wiggling back against Flint with a moan. "Oh yes. I mean, also the buckle. I need to be more naked."

"Very naked." Flint purred in agreement, nibbling at his earlobe. Fortunately, he also managed to apply himself to the task of getting Silver disrobed, as well as himself, and soon Silver was arching against the gloriously naked body of his ginger god, wrapping his arms up around Flint's neck and drinking in his kisses.

“I’m ready for my wedding present,” Silver whispered, teeth dragging along the curve of Flint’s jaw and nipping at his neck.

Flint's palms smoothed over his ass, squeezing briefly before letting his fingers tease down the crack and against his hole. "Mmm, you are, aren't you? My hungry little cock slut."

“That’s Mrs. Cock Slut to you.”

“That would imply…”

“Oh, I _know_ what I imply!” Silver did not, in fact, know quite what he was implying, but that was besides the point. He took a step backwards, blindly aiming for the bed and trying to wiggle his hips sexily as he did.

"That I'm Mr. Cock Slut?"

"Exactly!" The bed was, apparently, closer than he'd thought, but Silver thought he did a pretty damn good job of turning his fall backwards onto it into an intentionally sensual tumble. "Now... come _ravish_ me."

"But of course," Flint purred. Then, to Silver's dismay, he turned to retrieve a glittery gift bag from the bedside table. He offered it to Silver with both hands. "Happy wedding, my little darling."

As much as Silver would have preferred an immediate dicking, he had to admit, Flint's manner with the gift _was_ very sweet, and the packaging was very sparkly. He sat up and crossed his legs, setting the bag down and starting to pull out the multiple layers of rainbow tissue paper. Underneath all of it was.... "A dildo?" He pulled the flesh coloured silicone out of the bag and turned it over in his hands. It was certainly a very nice length and width, but... "Don't I have _your_ cock?"

"Exactly," Flint agreed. "Look at the tag."

Confused, Silver grabbed for the dangling string, reading the neatly printed label. "Make your own..." Excited realization rushed over him. He stared up at Flint. "Really?"

Flint smirked. "Don't you recognize it?"

"It doesn't have any freckles," Silver pointed out, then gave the toy an experimental suck, humming appreciatively. "Oh yes. Now I recognize it."

"Good," Flint purred, climbing onto the bed and leaning down to kiss him. "Because now I intend to fuck you with it while my real cock goes into your sweet little mouth."

Just the idea of it was enough to make Silver's eyes roll back. "Just like I always dreamed," he groaned, pulling Flint down on top of him.

“That’s right, babe,” Flint breathed against Silver’s lips. “No more Sophie’s Choice.” Flint rolled them over on the bed, until Silver lay on top of him. “Now, turn around.”

“You’ve given this a lot of thought,” Silver murmured in contentment, letting his tongue trail down Flint’s neck and across his collarbones.

“Yes, you’re lucky I’m such a strategic mastermind.” One of his hands groped blindly for Silver, who was slithering down his body, and not at all cooperating vis-a-vis the Grand Plan. “Bring that beautiful ass over here, god damn it.”

There better be lube under the pillow. Flint distinctly remembered instructing Muldoon exactly where to leave the lube when he’d left Silver’s Best Dude to take care of the sundries. He grabbed hold of Silver's hips to forcibly manhandle him into place, then shoved his hand under the pillow, smacking it against what proved to be a very large bottle of KY. Good man.

“Christ, what have I done to deserve you?” Flint whispered right into Silver’s asshole.

Silver, meanwhile, found himself utterly entranced with a faceful of Flint’s cock. Blissfully unconcerned about his own needs for the time being, except the need to get his lips around the engorged head, he closed his eyes and allowed himself to savor the musky flavor of his husband’s arousal. His _husband_ , holy shit! How the _fuck_ did he ever pull that one off? It was certainly a step above poodle-groomer!

"I so leveled up," he declared as his lips left Flint's cock with a pop. "I fucking win at groupieness. Groupie-ing? Am I the groupiest?"

“You’re the Groupie King, baby.”

"Good. Because - mmmph." Words weren't nearly as important as having Flint's magnificent cock in his mouth, he decided, sucking hungrily until he was swallowing around the girth of Flint's cock.

A shiver traveled all the way up his spine and made his hair rise on ends as, suddenly, the flat of Flint’s tongue traversed his hole and probed around his opening. “Don’t stop,” Flint’s breath tickled the sensitive skin behind his balls and Silver moaned in contentment, trailing his own tongue up and down the length of Flint’s fat cock. Then, Flint’s hot mouth was lathing at his sack, caressing the sensitive skin, sucking his balls into his mouth, one by one, while his fingers pressed against Silver’s hole.

Silver couldn't imagine a more perfect moment. "I like being Mrs. Silver-Flint," he murmured before returning his attentions to Flint's cock.

Silver’s asshole was a work of art. First of all, that prime real estate, located in the valley between two of the most perfect globes created by God, the likes of which Flint’s dreams (and hopefully his father’s nightmares) were made of, could not be beat. Second, it was tireless and voracious, yet tender and beautiful like the petals of some exotic flower. Flint would and have worshipped at its altar ceaselessly, and took great care to treat it with the respect it so clearly deserved.

“Mmmm, you’re gonna look so good, baby, stretched around this cock… while you’re sucking me off.”

One of these days, Flint would compose a symphony in honor of that ass. Or maybe just a drinking shanty. He was three fingers deep and his own cock twitched inside Silver’s mouth. “Don’t let me come yet.” Oh no, he was just getting started.

Gently, he removed his fingers and quickly applied a copious amount of lube to their new toy.

“This how you wanted it, baby?” Flint asked, pressing the dildo into the slicked opening, loving the way it opened up and tightened around the silicone shaft. “You want to just fucking spitroast yourself on my cocks?”

Silver’s lusty moan sent burning jolts of desire into Flint’s gut.

“Fuck, you’re beautiful.” And he was. Back arched for Flint, ass thrusting against his fist that held firmly onto the dildo, fucking Silver deep and wide with it as he bobbed up and down on Flint’s throbbing cock. Beads of sweat pooling in the ever-so-appealing indents above those perfectly pert globes of his incredible ass. “Fucking hell, baby, you’re amazing.” Flint wrapped his own lips hungrily around the head of Silver’s leaking cock and sucked him in greedily, hand continuing to pump into his asshole as he did so.

His attentions only proved to make Silver more voracious, groaning like nothing in the world could be better than being pounded by Flint's cock and Flint's cock. His thighs trembled as he rocked back against the dildo, fingers cupping, caressing Flint's sack. It was near enough to drive Flint to madness, but this was only the start of his plans, and he fully intended to see them through to completion. He swallowed around Silver's cock, angling each push of the toy until Silver was crying out around him, muffled and helpless, finally pulsing and spilling hot and thick in Flint's mouth.

Even through his orgasm, Silver's mouth was hot and eager, and for a moment Flint considered letting go, fucking up into that sweet little mouth until he came down Silver's throat. It took a herculean effort to pull Silver off of him, especially with Silver whimpering in disappointment, lips trying to reach for his retreating cock. Flint pulled Silver back into the pillows and straddled his hips to keep him in place. "I have plans," he said with a smirk, and captured Silver's pout with a hard kiss. Then he sat up and took himself in hand, letting his gaze feast on the beauty that was his husband's naked form stretched out under him, stroking firm and fast until pleasure took him and his seed spurted in slick arcs across Silver's abs and chest.

"Mmm, yes...." Silver's hands rubbed up Flint’s thighs and over his hips, voice an appreciative purr. "Mark your territory, Mr. Flint...."

"You dirty little fucker." Flint grinned as he leaned down to kiss him again, panting against his lips. He caught Silver's hands before they could stroke over his own come-stained stomach. "Leave it. I have plans."

"I like all these dirty plans," Silver murmured, smiling against his mouth.

Flint rose from the bed, taking the toy with him and disappearing into the en suite bathroom. Silver lay on the bed, flushed and panting, as Flint’s seed cooled against his heated skin. He congratulated himself once again for scoring such a master strategist for a spouse. Silver closed his eyes, reminding himself not to fall asleep.

“James?”

The water in the bathroom was turned off. “Mmm? Miss me?”

“In sickness _and_ in health,” Silver muttered with a complacent grin.

In another moment, Flint reappeared, coming over to the bed and looking at Silver through heavily lidded eyes, his gaze so languid and heavy that Silver could almost feel the heat of it against his skin. Flint still held the wedding gift in his right hand, poised like a deadly weapon and pointed right at Silver, as his left hand came to stroke over his cock, already semi-erect again and looking no less delectable for having been inside Silver’s mouth mere minutes prior.

“Is my blushing bride ready for round two?” Flint smirked.

“Fuck you and _yes_!” Silver responded with verve.

“That’s my insatiable boy,” Flint smiled and leaned over Silver to capture his lips with his own again. Flint’s hand trailed over Silver’s stomach and chest, fingers sliding into his own spend, scooping it up into his hand.

"Insatiable and messy," Silver agreed, happily nibbling at Flint's lower lip.

"Very," Flint purred. Then he sat up, smiling down on him as he drew the head of the dildo down Silver's midline and over his abs. "Did I tell you how fucking good you looked with my cock up your perfect little ass?"

"You can tell me again, if you want." Silver's back arched, enjoying the tease of the silicone, sliding slick over his skin.

“You took it like such a good boy,” Flint whispered, eyes caressing the length of Silver’s body. “And now you’re still hungry for more.”

Silver only managed to whimper in anticipation by way of a reply. His eyes took in Flint’s heaving, flushed chest, with its kaleidoscope of freckles hidden among the sparse tufts of golden hair, like fields of wheat in the summer heat. He wanted to put his mouth all over Flint’s skin, until the taste and touch of his entire body became second nature. He almost did not notice as Flint rubbed the remnants of his come all over the toy.

“Open up,” Flint beckoned, the silicone pressing against Silver’s lower lip.

“Yes, James.” Silver’s lips fell open and his mouth was filled with that same essence that a few minutes ago was denied him because Flint had _plans_. Well, Silver approved wholeheartedly of these plans. Flint’s knee nudged against his inner thigh and he opened up there too, enveloping Flint’s body as it settled in between, his cock fully erect again and nuzzling against Silver’s balls.

Just a few minutes ago he'd thought that he had everything in life, gagging on Flint's magnificent cock as Flint pounded his ass with the toy. Now he realized that he was wrong. This, this was everything, hungrily sucking Flint's come from the smooth silicone while the head of Flint's cock nudged his ass, promising more. "Please," he pulled away from the dildo to gasp, trying to squirm closer. "Please fuck me, husband, oh god..."

"And you beg so prettily," Flint breathed, shifting to push Silvers calves up against his shoulders. Then he was rocking into him, filling him perfectly, pressing the dildo back to Silver's lips and into his mouth.

If Silver could have spoken he would have promised Flint the world in exchange for this, whispered every beautiful vow he'd said this morning for all the world to hear. Anything to spend the rest of his life getting fucked like this, fucked so perfectly. And amplifying his pleasure was the knowledge of Flint's, the smoldering hunger in his husband's eyes as he buried himself in him again and again.

“John… _Jesus_.”

Having Flint incoherent like this: this was Silver’s calling. He clenched tighter around Flint’s cock, moaning filthily around the toy in his mouth to convey his sentiments of _Yes, god yes!_ He pushed Flint’s hand away, freeing his lips so he could speak, pulling Flint closer by the scruff of his neck so that his words would fall against those beautiful, lush lips.

“I need you to come inside me.”

“Oh, god, John!” Flint stuttered, his face buried in the hollow of Silver’s neck. “Fucking hell, baby.” His hand slipped in between their perspiration-slicked bodies to wrap around Silver’s wildly throbbing cock.

“Will you come for me, James?”

“Fuck… yes. Together.” Flint’s fist pumped over the sensitized flesh of Silver’s cock, thumb pressing into the slit with exquisite precision. “Come for me, baby.”

How could Silver refuse such a request? He arched up into Flint's thrusts as much as he could, letting the perfect pounding of his cock push him over the edge. As ecstasy overwhelmed him, he heard Flint groan his pleasure, hips stuttering hard into him as he spilled inside him, hot and deep and perfect.

 _Mine,_ Silver thought through the waves of pleasure, pulling Flint's mouth back to his. _Mine for always._

Afterwards, as he cuddled closer to Flint, Silver heard the dildo fall off the bed and bounce against the floor, but he didn't care. All that mattered was curling up against Flint, being encircled by the warm strength of his arms.

“Did I satisfy my young, hot boo tonight?” Flint kissed into the curve of Silver’s neck, fingers combing through his unruly curls.

“Un-fucking-real,” was all Silver could manage, with a helpless giggle.

“John?” Flint’s voice tethered him to wakefulness even as Silver’s body sank into the pleasant lethargy of the thoroughly well-fucked. “I hope you know I’ll still love you even when you’re not the groupiest?” Silver snorted against Flint’s chest. “I mean it,” Flint smiled into the dark curls. “And I hope you still love me too, when I’m old and gray. And not punk.”

Silver opened his eyes and stared into a sea of soothing green. “You’re never going to be old and gray. You don’t even have any hair,” he pointed out, smugly.

“I’ll fucking grow it back out, just to be ornery!”

“That is exactly something that you would do, isn’t it?”

“Just you watch!”

Silver laughed and pressed another kiss to the corner of Flint’s mouth. “I’m really going to enjoy arguing with you for the rest of my life,” he sighed and allowed his eyes to finally fall closed.

~FIN~

**Author's Note:**

> Meet Flint's Poodles
> 
> Athos (very dignified)  
> 
> 
> Porthos (look how fabulous)  
> 
> 
> Aramis (10/10 will bite your dick off in your sleep and blame someone else)  
> 
> 
> Just like Flint's poodles, we respond to treats but not commands. Please don't forget to pet us before leaving!


End file.
